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Show G0SEIIE1TT8 DUE OVEH GIL DID MIS Senator Swanson Explains Bill Dravn at Instance of Secretary Daniels Proposing Pro-posing Settlements. PROPERTIES ARE ON FEDERAL LAND Intention Is to Compensate Claimants on Naval Re-' Re-' serves 1 and 2 in California. WASHINGTON, Feb. 6 Plane of the navy department to lake over by presidential presi-dential proclamation and lo operate all oil and sas wells on naval petroleum re-t-crves No. 1 and No. 2 in California were explained today to the senate naval commit com-mit lee. Senator Swanion. acting chairman, explained ex-plained that he had drawn a mil aftar a conference with Secretary Daniels and Attorney-General Gregory and that its purpofo was to settle all disputes with private claimants which have tied up the lamia for teverul years. It way desired, he ?aid, to give the president power to offer a prke even to claimants who presumably pre-sumably had no legal title to their wells. Should they refuse tlml price, they could have recourse to the courts. If they lost there they would receive 75 per cent of the original offer. Lieutenant-Commander N. H. TVrlght, in charge of oil reserves for the department, depart-ment, was the chief witness. He said that it the navy took over and operated the f,30 welJs on reserve No. 'J. existing exist-ing con tracts with various California muni' i pa II ties would be carried out. If nccessMi v. the additional gas wells would be drilled. The present wells, he said, ou!d . pruduce sufficient oil to last the navy for two years of war and eight or nine subsequent yearn of peace and in addition would furnish a rescne of 250,-u 250,-u 00, POO barrels. . Stock Declining." It developed that the stock of oil In California is declining so rapidly that a serious si t ua tion is threa tened . Com-niander Com-niander Wiisrht said passage of the proposed pro-posed bill will enable the navy to de velop Us oil field to meet that situation if the extensions by the private owners failed to overcome the shortage. The navy intended, he said, to keep up the Ca Itfornia oil supply and to trade its oil at the pipe lines for refined products at suitable delivery points for the fleet. While the senate committee was in session the house public lands committee held a hearing on the Ferris oil leasing bill. Benjamin .T. Bice, representing the Roxana. Petroleum company, a foreign-owned foreign-owned concern, testified that his company favored legislation as to leases and royalties royal-ties that would eua-b!e it and other independents inde-pendents to compete successfully with the Standard Oil company. Mr. Rice emphatically denied that there are any German holdings in the interests of which the Roxana company is a part: the Shell Transportation & Trading company com-pany ol England and the Roval Dutch Development company of Holland. Dutch Government Interested. The Dutch government, he said, is a partner in the combination. The Roxana company, he said, owns O.Oo or 15.000 acres of oil lands in Oklahoma, 20,000 or ;j.n,0f0 acres in Texas. 3oo or 4000 acres in Kansas. Unn or 2000 acres of patented lands in Wyoming, and has an investment invest-ment of more than S20.OO0.O00 in California, Califor-nia, with pipe lines in that state, one In Oklahoma and another under construction. construc-tion. The witness said all of the Roxana company's products not sola in this country coun-try iire shipped to the allies. Mr. Ri.-e said that if the government turned oil lands over to private companies com-panies unconditionally it could not control con-trol the waste of oil resources. Waste could be avoided, he insisted, by a graduated gradu-ated lease system. Concerning the Osage field in Oklahoma, Okla-homa, Commander Wright said it was tied up under trust agreement, but added that oil from that field as well as California Cali-fornia was needed because of the possibility pos-sibility of "an Atlantic war and a Pacific Pa-cific war." |