Show THE AND THE government the opinion of the government experts regarding the possibilities of the oil of the west is well illustrated by the statement of george otis smith director of the united states geological survey when he be announced that no more shale lands in utah will be withdrawn from entry he said it has been demonstrated that tile the latent possibilities of the oil shale of this region as a source of petroleum is enormous it is alar alsi known that there is locked up in these sha es a vast amount of nitrogen which can be ec as a byproduct by product in the drefin gnp of shale and used in the manufacturing of and explosives with all this 1 in rma tion at hand the government has held that the oil shale land sheild not be withdrawn but should be cl classified sifted as mineral land and made avail abc to the public under the united states m mg ing law regardless of the last sentence the government has withdrawn shale lands in the r past and as in the case of oil land locators nobody has been sure whether his rights would be respected or not the result has been that the have not been developed and the present announcement is a good deal like locking the stable door after it is too late the mining review has always contended that the oil shale lands should not be withdrawn at all but should be left open to development by individuals and corporations we have predicted that the policy of withdrawing both oil and shale sections and of riding roughshod over the rights of locators who were on the ground would result in the fields not being developed nor 0 the processes perfected when the crisis should arrive the present demand for oil is bearing out our contentions crises like this are certain to appear in the history of the nation many of them without warning and preparedness should be the watchword of course there can be no claim that the present war appeared without warning figuratively its smoke has been on the horizon ever since the battle of manila bay there is no use crying over spilled milk but the fact remains that if the individual oil investigators had been sure that the government would follow a policy of hands off the processes for the reduction of oil would now be perfected and available in the hour of need we can hope that there will be no further interference with their development |