[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 47 (Tuesday, March 14, 1995)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E587]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

[[Page E587]]
                        WELFARE FOR GOLD MINERS

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                           HON. GEORGE MILLER

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, March 14, 1995
  Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I would like to bring to the 
attention of all Members an article which appeared in the March 13, 
1995, issue of U.S. News and World Report, and to insert in the Record 
an editorial by the editor-in-chief, Mortimer B. Zuckerman. The 
article, by Michael Satchell, reports on the deplorable situation now 
confronting Yellowstone National Park due to the onerous and archaic 
provisions of the 1872 mining law. Mr. Satchell describes the ill-
advised efforts of a Canadian-owned mining company to open a gold mine 
on the outskirts of Yellowstone Park, thereby creating a potentially 
dangerous predicament for one of the crown jewels of our National Park 
System. Mr. Zuckerman's editorial confronts the absurdities of the 
archaic law, daring Congress to ``show some muscle about abuses that 
lose Federal revenues'' by taking on ``the politically powerful mining 
industry and its Western congressional allies'' and reforming this 
``silly law''.
  Mr. Speaker, this coverage by U.S. News and World Report is 
particularly relevant and timely, in light of the recent introduction 
in the Senate of yet another industry-backed bill--craftily designed to 
look like reform but, in reality, devised to insure that the mining 
industry maintains its free-ride on the public dole. Representative 
Nick J. Rahall and I have also introduced legislation, H.R. 357, 
identical to the bill passed by the House last year on a three-to-one 
bipartisan vote. Last year, over 300 House Members--including 70 
Republicans--voted to bring some fairness into the hard rock mining 
system. This year, instead of only cutting school lunches and rent 
money for poor working families, I hope the Republican majority will 
have the determination to expunge some of the welfare enjoyed by the 
corporate elite. Reforming the 1872 mining law by enacting H.R. 357 
would be a big step in the right direction.
             [From U.S. News & World Report, Mar. 13, 1995]

                       Bury This in Grant's Tomb

                       (By Mortimer B. Zuckerman)
       How's this for a dream? You are free to roam anywhere on 
     600 million acres of public land in the West, staking out 
     mining claims in the happy knowledge that if you strike gold 
     or silver or copper, you can extract your find absolutely 
     free. And, dream on, you will have the option on purchasing 
     the land outright at a price of no more than $5 an acre.
       It's no dream. An antique called the General Mining Law of 
     1872, signed by President Ulysses S. Grant to encourage 
     migration into the Rocky Mountain states, provides such 
     beneficence. The West has long been settled, but prospectors 
     and mining companies are still getting rich off the 1872 law, 
     and the taxpayers are still getting robbed.
       It gets worse. You could have bought--or patented--17,000 
     acres of oil-shale claims near Rifle, Colo., for a mere 
     $42,000 and a month later sold the package to Shell Oil for 
     $37 million. But someone beat you to it. And that deal was no 
     freak. An investigation by the U.S. General Accounting Office 
     of some 20 patents examined at random found the government 
     had been paid $4,500 for claims worth somewhere between $14 
     million and $48 million. Just last year the Secretary of the 
     Interior was infuriated to discover he was obligated to let a 
     Canadian company acquire, for a nominal amount, Nevada land 
     with gold reserves estimated to be worth $10 billion. He 
     called it ``the biggest heist since the days of Butch Cassidy 
     and the Sundance Kid.''
       To date, 3.2 million acres of public land--an area the size 
     of Connecticut--have been sold. More than $230 billion in 
     mineral reserves in 13 Western states has been given away 
     since the passage of the 1872 law--more than 315 million 
     ounces of gold, 5.5 billion ounces of silver, 79.5 million 
     tons of copper, 19.2 million tons of lead and 13.9 million 
     tons of zinc. Today, as much as $4 billion worth of hard-rock 
     materials is taken out every year. The language of the law is 
     such that a lot of ``mining'' land has been bought, then used 
     to build everything from private homes to gambling casinos 
     and luxury resorts. The not-so-funny name for all this is the 
     Great Terrain Robbery.
       Injury is added to insult. The law contains no 
     environmental protection. The mining residue--some 70 billion 
     tons of tailings--has been left exposed to the elements, 
     polluting rivers and ground water. There are also 550,000 
     abandoned mines and open pits, such as the infamous Berkeley 
     Pit in Butte, Mont.--a mile wide, a mile and a half long, 
     half a mile deep--filled with water that is more acidic than 
     vinegar. You know who bears the cleanup cost. Yes, you, the 
     taxpayer. A new crisis has emerged with the plans of Noranda. 
     Inc., a Canadian corporation with a history of environmental 
     problems, to mine 3 miles from Yellowstone Park's 
     northeastern boundary.
       Today there is a moratorium on further land transfers. Yet 
     nearly 400 patent applications are back up from companies 
     that hope to slip through their claims to get their hands on 
     $21 billion in reserves before the 1872 act is reformed.
       The reformers want the mining companies to be treated like 
     other extractive industries, which, astonishingly, they are 
     not. First, fair prices for these patents should be 
     determined by the marketplace; they should include the cost 
     of reclamation and the enforcement of environmental 
     standards. Second, there is the issue of royalties. Loggers, 
     coal producers and offshore oil and gas companies pay 
     royalties when they extract wealth from public land. 
     Reformers want mining companies to pay a royalty on their ore 
     based on gross sales. With net revenues estimated at 25 
     percent of gross values extracted, a royalty is easily 
     affordable. So is compliance with environmental standards--
     federal standards, because oversight by the states, which the 
     mining industry favors, has proven weak. It also makes sense 
     to withdraw some federal lands from mining if they are close 
     to national parks or similar natural resources.
       Why has this silly law lasted this long? Because a 
     politically powerful mining industry and its Western 
     congressional allies have blocked any revision. The argument 
     that it would cripple a key regional industry and costs jobs 
     in essentially a rational for gouging the public.
       Here is an opportunity for the ``new'' Republican Party. If 
     it is determined to expunge abuses in federal spending, it 
     should show some muscle about abuses that lose federal 
     revenues.
     

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