Part 9 (2/2)

Until the Attorney General's ruling in April, 1890, it is doubtful that Major Powell suspected the full power he possessed. At least he had taken the trouble on November 9, 1889, to request the segregation of 8,000,000 acres in the Snake River drainage basin in Wyoming and Idaho 5 5 - and he would not have asked the withdrawal of a specific tract if he had a.s.sumed that the whole public domain was automatically withdrawn. By the spring of 1890 he knew his strength, and he had begun to understand the violence of his opposition. - and he would not have asked the withdrawal of a specific tract if he had a.s.sumed that the whole public domain was automatically withdrawn. By the spring of 1890 he knew his strength, and he had begun to understand the violence of his opposition.

Yet he seems not to have feared it as much as he might have. Pushed by a combination of accident and public urgency into a control of land policies more complete than he could ever have dreamed of having, he could appreciate the need for haste without wanting to miss the opportunity through letting himself be crowded. He not only pursued his general plan, but he practically incorporated himself in it, and of necessity, when his enemies rallied to attack him, they attacked him through those parts of the plan that were furthest out of line with popular beliefs. He was as busy as he liked to be, trying on the one hand to convert short-range politicians and short-range settlers to long-range thinking, and on the other to balk the water and land companies with plans as long-range as his own, but with somewhat more private than public interest in their success.6 He did not know how much public support he could summon, but he hoped for enough, and for long enough, to let him complete at least the basic essentials of the survey. He did not know how much public support he could summon, but he hoped for enough, and for long enough, to let him complete at least the basic essentials of the survey.

The only thing that kept him from being impossibly busy was the very real efficiency of his bureaus and the high esprit of his collaborators. Thanks to careful organization and the combining of the clerical staffs, the Bureau of Ethnology and the Geological Survey could almost run themselves if need be; and the Irrigation Survey complemented the Geological Survey in concrete ways. The foundation of both was the topographical map. Powell accordingly devoted almost eighty per cent of his Irrigation Survey budget to topography, and moved the $200,000 allocated for that purpose in the Geological Survey budget to areas not covered by the Irrigation Survey. Shaping the map was slow; but it was essential, essential enough to justify even the stopping of a process of settlement that had begun with Jamestown. To win the support that would let him get it done, Powell intensified his missionary campaign with Congress and the public.

He explained his plan and the scientific observations upon which it was based in a series of meetings with the House Committee on Irrigation between February and April, 1890.7 He aired it in speeches, wrote it for the magazines, repeated it in his published reports, argued it at dinners, dictated it in patient letters to angry or inquiring or plaintive correspondents. To work through that body of report and polemic is to realize how consistent, by now, his views about the arid region had become, and how widely his plan reached to embrace the related problems of land, water, erosion, floods, soil conservation, even the new one of hydroelectric power; and how behind the plan was a settled belief in the worth of the small farmer and the necessity of protecting him both from speculators and from natural conditions he did not understand and could not combat. He aired it in speeches, wrote it for the magazines, repeated it in his published reports, argued it at dinners, dictated it in patient letters to angry or inquiring or plaintive correspondents. To work through that body of report and polemic is to realize how consistent, by now, his views about the arid region had become, and how widely his plan reached to embrace the related problems of land, water, erosion, floods, soil conservation, even the new one of hydroelectric power; and how behind the plan was a settled belief in the worth of the small farmer and the necessity of protecting him both from speculators and from natural conditions he did not understand and could not combat.

The key ideas 8 8 were hammered at over and over in an attempt to break down tradition and the feeling that it was unpatriotic in a Westerner to admit that his country was dry. The best and the safest agriculture, and the oldest, was irrigation agriculture. And it was fatal to believe that tillage altered the climate. Tillage brought no more rain than burning the prairies, or sending up balloons, or any of the other schemes. Climate depended on meteorological forces too sweeping to be changed by any local expedients. were hammered at over and over in an attempt to break down tradition and the feeling that it was unpatriotic in a Westerner to admit that his country was dry. The best and the safest agriculture, and the oldest, was irrigation agriculture. And it was fatal to believe that tillage altered the climate. Tillage brought no more rain than burning the prairies, or sending up balloons, or any of the other schemes. Climate depended on meteorological forces too sweeping to be changed by any local expedients.

And no one should expect to reclaim all the western lands. Twenty per cent was probably an optimistic estimate of what was reclaimable - but even that twenty per cent would total more than all the lands tilled so far in the nation. To reclaim that twenty per cent, water would have to be available, and most of it would have to come from the large rivers. Dams on these rivers would have far-reaching effects. Properly engineered, they would protect from floods instead of causing them as at Johnstown. They would allow the reclamation of arid lands on the headwaters and swamp lands near the mouths, and they would permit a controlled flow that would prevent wasteful runoff. Also, one of the first needs in the utilization of these great rivers was a legal one, for rivers were an interstate, sometimes an international, matter, and as yet there was no clear body of law covering their owners.h.i.+p and use.

The best way to approach that legal question was by first organizing the West into hydrographic basins which would be virtually self-governing and hence able to negotiate with other similar basins, as well as to control their own watersheds clear to the drainage divides. Inter-basin water law would offer a sound basis for the development of interstate water law, whereas to permit development of water by local franchise was to permit monopoly and waste and the peonage of the small farmer. Moreover, no individual or company could afford the enormous engineering works that were necessary for proper development of the great rivers and the maximum use of water. The ideal way was co-operation: he would have supported federal construction only as a preventive of local grabbing. But however the works were to be built, the absolutely necessary first step was a systematic and careful survey, and that was the proper function of the government's scientific bureaus.

Over and over he repeated and explained and ill.u.s.trated his thesis that the new conditions of the West demanded new inst.i.tutions. These he outlined in his three articles for Century Century in the spring of 1890, he incorporated them in his reports, he used them as a basis of principle from which to answer ca.n.a.l companies demanding to be rea.s.sured in their rights or to be told what their rights were, or coyly offering to co-operate with the survey in the selection of reservoir sites. Probably he convinced some, perhaps many. Certainly he did more than his part to air the West's peculiar problems and emphasize the need for more forethought in its settlement than had gone into the settlement of the East and Midwest. He found himself both a champion and a scapegoat, for Congress, which had closed the public domain and repudiated the myth of the Garden of the World, was looking for someone to blame. There were three House bills and one Senate bill already introduced, all aimed at canceling the Joint Resolution's provisions. A good deal of Powell's missionary work was actually self-defense. in the spring of 1890, he incorporated them in his reports, he used them as a basis of principle from which to answer ca.n.a.l companies demanding to be rea.s.sured in their rights or to be told what their rights were, or coyly offering to co-operate with the survey in the selection of reservoir sites. Probably he convinced some, perhaps many. Certainly he did more than his part to air the West's peculiar problems and emphasize the need for more forethought in its settlement than had gone into the settlement of the East and Midwest. He found himself both a champion and a scapegoat, for Congress, which had closed the public domain and repudiated the myth of the Garden of the World, was looking for someone to blame. There were three House bills and one Senate bill already introduced, all aimed at canceling the Joint Resolution's provisions. A good deal of Powell's missionary work was actually self-defense.

Meantime he was doing more than missionary work. By June, 1890, in addition to the nearly 30,000,000 acres of irrigable lands he had tentatively selected,9 he had designated two hundred reservoir sites to the General Land Office for reservation. But before any of the 30,000,000 acres could be certified to the President for restoration to settlement, the t.i.tles to all privately held parcels within the large districts had to be checked. Powell still had a dozen clerks over in the General Land Office turning pages, but by the time the appropriations committees got around to him at the beginning of June he had been unable actually to certify a single acre. he had designated two hundred reservoir sites to the General Land Office for reservation. But before any of the 30,000,000 acres could be certified to the President for restoration to settlement, the t.i.tles to all privately held parcels within the large districts had to be checked. Powell still had a dozen clerks over in the General Land Office turning pages, but by the time the appropriations committees got around to him at the beginning of June he had been unable actually to certify a single acre.

Nevertheless the request for funds and the plan of operations that he sent to Secretary Vilas in April 10 10 was breezily confident. He now asked grandly, on the scale that Stewart and Teller had at first proposed. By now Dutton had trained a staff of hydraulic engineers; there were people to make the survey move. So Powell asked for $720,000, plus another $70,000 for map engraving, cement research, and office rental. The total was more than three times his last Irrigation Survey appropriation. Though Dutton had been skeptical from the beginning about the propriety of devoting so much of the appropriation to topography, Powell looked upon the map as the basis of the whole plan he had submitted to the irrigation clique in 1888. was breezily confident. He now asked grandly, on the scale that Stewart and Teller had at first proposed. By now Dutton had trained a staff of hydraulic engineers; there were people to make the survey move. So Powell asked for $720,000, plus another $70,000 for map engraving, cement research, and office rental. The total was more than three times his last Irrigation Survey appropriation. Though Dutton had been skeptical from the beginning about the propriety of devoting so much of the appropriation to topography, Powell looked upon the map as the basis of the whole plan he had submitted to the irrigation clique in 1888.11 He busied himself gathering ammunition for the conversion of the appropriations committees, and while he was doing so the Senate gave notice of its temper by pa.s.sing a resolution demanding to know how much, if any, of the money appropriated for irrigation surveys had been diverted to topographic work, and if so, ”by what authority of law where appropriations are made by Congress for several purposes the money appropriated for one purpose can be diverted and used for another purpose for which an appropriation is also made in the same statute.” 12 12 The animus and the apoplectic turgidity of the resolution would have told Powell who had got it up. Stewart had found what he conceived to be a loose stone in the Major's wall, and he was busy digging. If he could cast doubt on the legality of the Irrigation Survey's topographic work, he would have a chance to bring the whole thing down. Actually Stewart had known from the beginning that Powell based everything upon the topographic map. But he also knew that Powell had been criticized for taking more authority on occasion than the law allowed him. Having fathered it himself, he knew that the enabling law of the Irrigation Survey was irregular and that Powell might be made to seem responsible for it. He would personally take steps in that direction. The animus and the apoplectic turgidity of the resolution would have told Powell who had got it up. Stewart had found what he conceived to be a loose stone in the Major's wall, and he was busy digging. If he could cast doubt on the legality of the Irrigation Survey's topographic work, he would have a chance to bring the whole thing down. Actually Stewart had known from the beginning that Powell based everything upon the topographic map. But he also knew that Powell had been criticized for taking more authority on occasion than the law allowed him. Having fathered it himself, he knew that the enabling law of the Irrigation Survey was irregular and that Powell might be made to seem responsible for it. He would personally take steps in that direction.

The Resolution that Stewart and other Westerners pushed through on May 31, 1890, had as its purpose the repudiation of the irrigation legislation, at least as it presently stood, and the scotching of the man who, having been put in charge, had shown that he would fight for it. But it was not the first action of 1890 that aimed at the vilification of Major Powell. That first action had come at the very start of the new year, when the spies and whisperers, sensing another opportunity and seeing formidable forces attacking Powell from the front, came out from behind the arras with their knives in their hands.

4. Spies and Whisperers Again

ON JANUARY 12, 1890, a Sunday, the New York Herald was ban nered with scare headlines:

SCIENTISTS WAGE BITTER WARFARE. PROF. COPE, OF THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA, BRINGS SERIOUS CHARGES AGAINST DIRECTOR POWELL AND PROF. MARSH, OF THE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY. CORROBORATION IN PLENTY. LEARNED MEN COME TO PENNSYLVANIAN'S SUPPORT WITH ALLEGATIONS OF IGNORANCE, PLAGIARISM AND INCOMPETENCE AGAINST THE ACCUSED OFFICIALS. IMPORTANT COLLATERAL ISSUE. THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES, OF WHICH PROFESSOR MARSH IS PRESIDENT, IS CHARGED WITH BEING PACKED IN THE INTERESTS OF THE SURVEY. RED HOT DENIALS PUT FORTH. HEAVY BLOWS DEALT IN ATTACK AND DEFENCE AND LOTS OF HARD NUTS PROVIDED FOR SCIENTIFIC DIGESTION. WILL CONGRESS INVESTIGATE? 1 1

This time Cope and his cohorts had come out loaded for bear. It is doubtful that any modem controversy among men of learning has generated more venom than this one did. All the old charges were there in the Herald's Herald's full and delighted story, all distilled and aged but not mellowed through twenty years of hatred. Powell was not the princ.i.p.al object of attack, but he took some blows aimed at Marsh and he took some in his own right. He was a political boss who had built a scientific Tammany within the government, intimidated or bought off his opposition, gained control of the National Academy, and made himself head of a great scientific monopoly. His bureaus were asylums for Congressmen's sons and provided sinecures for press agents and pap for college professors, and the activities and influence of these were used in turn to milk great appropriations from Congress. full and delighted story, all distilled and aged but not mellowed through twenty years of hatred. Powell was not the princ.i.p.al object of attack, but he took some blows aimed at Marsh and he took some in his own right. He was a political boss who had built a scientific Tammany within the government, intimidated or bought off his opposition, gained control of the National Academy, and made himself head of a great scientific monopoly. His bureaus were asylums for Congressmen's sons and provided sinecures for press agents and pap for college professors, and the activities and influence of these were used in turn to milk great appropriations from Congress.

Powell's personal learning was a fake, and in supporting Marsh he supported the worst snake, fake, and plagiarist in American science. Moreover Powell had stolen or duplicated the work of the state geological surveys; had jealously blocked publication of Cope's paleontological work done for the Hayden Survey; had insulted Cope by suggesting that some of Cope's collections actually belonged to the government; had obstructed geological work which contradicted his own; had attempted to dominate scientific meetings; had neglected mining geology in his conduct of the Geological Survey; and had misused Survey funds by sending Captain Dutton to Hawaii to study volcanoes.

As for Marsh, he was an incompetent, a plagiarist, a cheat. He consistently published the work of his a.s.sistants as his own; he failed to pay his helpers; he destroyed fossils in the field so that no one else could study them; he kept the enormous collections of the Geological Survey in his Yale laboratory under lock and key and refused other scientists access to them; and he had mixed them so hopelessly with the Yale collections that no one would ever be able to sort them out. He had conspired with Powell to pack the National Academy with Geological Survey stooges. He had committed every stupidity possible to a man who called himself a scientist. He had stolen some of his work from Cope, and his celebrated genealogy of the horse was a pure theft from the Russian Kowalevsky.

Supporting this blast was an extensive collection of letters and testimonials, gathered over a period of many years, as well as Endlich's 23,000 word smear which Congress had looked at and decided to ignore in 1885.

It was not, in spite of its hysterical extravagances, an attack to be laughed off. William Hosea Ballou, the Herald Herald reporter who had a.s.sembled it out of interviews with Cope, Endlich, Sterry Hunt, Persifor Frazer, a group of Marsh's disgruntled a.s.sistants, and another group of dissident and anti-Powell scientists, was obviously convinced that he had stumbled upon a good deal of fire as well as a lot of murky smoke. He did have the courtesy to bring the article to Powell and send it to Marsh before it appeared, and he ran Powell's reply in the same issue in which the charges were made. reporter who had a.s.sembled it out of interviews with Cope, Endlich, Sterry Hunt, Persifor Frazer, a group of Marsh's disgruntled a.s.sistants, and another group of dissident and anti-Powell scientists, was obviously convinced that he had stumbled upon a good deal of fire as well as a lot of murky smoke. He did have the courtesy to bring the article to Powell and send it to Marsh before it appeared, and he ran Powell's reply in the same issue in which the charges were made.

In that reply, Powell had one great advantage over Cope: hatred had not seared his thinking apparatus, and the dignity of his defence made the attack look as hysterical as in fact it was.

As Director of the Survey a great trust is placed upon me, and I recognize that I am responsible not only to the President of the United States, whose commission I bear, and to the Secretary who is my immediate chief, and to the Congress of the United States, to whom I make an annual report setting forth in full the transactions of the survey, but also to the people of the United States, whose servant I am.... I feel myself deeply responsible to the scientific men of the country also, for during a period of more than twenty years they have supported me and the work under my charge almost with unanimity....

Having put Cope where he belonged, in an envious minority, Powell traced step by step, with doc.u.ments at least as convincing as Cope's, the progress of almost two decades of malice, from the founding of the survey and the defeat of Hayden's forces to the Cope-Endlich attempt to smear him before the investigating committee of 1885.2 He corrected some of Cope's figures, especially with regard to the funds annually allocated to Marsh, and he defended Marsh's scientific reputation, leaving to Marsh himself the defense of his personal honesty. He stoutly defended his arrange inents with several state surveys for topographical mapping, categorically denied duplicating or stealing from any state survey, justified his press agent W. A. Croffut as the general editor of extensive survey publications, told Cope that any time he submitted a completed ma.n.u.script his paleontological volumes for the Hayden Survey would be published, and made some mildly deleterious remarks about ”species fiends” that applied about as well to Marsh as to Cope. And he concluded with a touch of kindly and ironic condescension: He corrected some of Cope's figures, especially with regard to the funds annually allocated to Marsh, and he defended Marsh's scientific reputation, leaving to Marsh himself the defense of his personal honesty. He stoutly defended his arrange inents with several state surveys for topographical mapping, categorically denied duplicating or stealing from any state survey, justified his press agent W. A. Croffut as the general editor of extensive survey publications, told Cope that any time he submitted a completed ma.n.u.script his paleontological volumes for the Hayden Survey would be published, and made some mildly deleterious remarks about ”species fiends” that applied about as well to Marsh as to Cope. And he concluded with a touch of kindly and ironic condescension: I am not willing to be betrayed into any statement which will do injustice to Professor Cope. He is the only one of the coterie who has scientific standing. The others are simply his tools and act on his inspiration. The Professor himself has done much valuable work for science. He has made great collections in the field and has described these collections with skill. Altogether he is a fair systematist. If his infirmities of character could be corrected by advancing age, if he could be made to realize that the enemy which he sees forever haunting him as a ghost is himself... he could yet do great work for science.

Professor Marsh's reply was marked by no such restraint and decorum. Having been attacked with talons, he replied with claws. First he collected a series of denials from people whom Cope had quoted against him. The denials in very few instances took back anything their authors had previously said about Marsh: they merely denied that Cope had been authorized to publish anything. Still, they prepared the way for Marsh's own turn in the Herald on the following Sunday.

Marsh's statement was cold, controlled, furious. He denied Cope's charges of plagiarism and misuse of his a.s.sistants, and to Cope's charges of scientific incompetence he replied with countercharges, notably with reference to Cope's achievement in articulating one skeleton backside-to. And he noted also Cope's raids on private collections, admitting that since Cope had sneaked into the Yale laboratory and stolen and published some of Marsh's uncompleted work he saw there, the Yale collections, including those of the Geological Survey, had indeed been closed to unauthorized persons, especially Professor Cope. ”Little men with big heads, unscrupulous in warfare, are not confined to Africa,” he said, ”and Stanley will recognize them here when he returns to America. Of such dwarfs we have unfortunately a few in science.”

And what of Cope's claim that Marsh had stolen his genealogy of the horse from Kowalevsky? Poppyc.o.c.k. Marsh had never seen Kowalevsky's work. He had convinced Thomas Henry Huxley of the true genealogy in 1876, and a few days later Huxley had cited the source of his altered opinions in a New York speech. More than that, Kowalevsky was as notorious in Europe as Cope was in America for raiding other people's museums. ”Kowalevsky,” wrote Professor Marsh with his teeth precisely together, ”was at last stricken with remorse and ended his unfortunate career by blowing out his own brains. Cope still lives, unrepentant.”

Cope had shot off all his ammunition in the first charge. He was scattered and routed by Powell's dignified immovability and by the bullwhip of Marsh's tongue. Given opportunity to make fresh statements so that the Herald Herald could keep its profitable controversy going, he replied only that ”the recklessness of a.s.sertion, the er roneousness of statement and the incapacity of comprehending our relative positions on the part of Professor Marsh render further discussion of the trivial matters upon which we disagree unnecessary, and my time is too fully occupied on more important subjects to permit me to waste it upon personal affairs which are already sufficiently before the public. Professor Marsh has recorded his views could keep its profitable controversy going, he replied only that ”the recklessness of a.s.sertion, the er roneousness of statement and the incapacity of comprehending our relative positions on the part of Professor Marsh render further discussion of the trivial matters upon which we disagree unnecessary, and my time is too fully occupied on more important subjects to permit me to waste it upon personal affairs which are already sufficiently before the public. Professor Marsh has recorded his views aere perenne, aere perenne, and may continue to do so without personal notice by E. D. Cope.” and may continue to do so without personal notice by E. D. Cope.” 3 3 But he was not to get away with any such lame and lofty curtain line. Marsh would have the last word. Cope's feeble rejoinder, he said, showed that he was now in the exact position of the boy who twisted the mule's tail. He was not so good-looking as he once was, but he knew more.

Up to a point, Marsh's cold triumph was justified. And yet, though discomfited and even discredited in the eyes of most scientific men, Cope could take a smoldering satisfaction in what he had done. It was both true and important that the ”personal affairs” toward which he now expressed indifference were ”sufficiently before the pub

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