Leonidas Merritt

Title: Article About Mineral Leases
Type: Newspaper
Date: April 5, 1890
Source: Duluth Evening News

Description: Mineral leases were sold by the state government to encourage and regulate prospecting and mining on state lands.
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Activities:

1. What do you think was stated in the law (mentioned in this article) that the legislature had recently passed?
   
   
   
   
   Answer: The article seems to suggest that these mineral leases would not have been possible to give without the passage of that law. We can then assume that the law either opened up new land for use by prospectors or allowed more leases to be sold in a certain period of time.
2. What benefits does the state get from the sale of these leases?
   
   
   
   
   Answer: The land will get developed, and the state will be able to get money for the use of the land, plus a 25-cent tax on each ton of ore taken out of mines on the land. The state will be able to get income from this land for many years from mines that are successful.
3. Why would a mining company want to pay the state large amounts of money over time when they have not prospected enough yet to know if a mine will be profitable?
   
   
   
   
   Answer: The company probably has already done some drilling on the site to determine whether or not there is any ore at all. Since they decided to go ahead with purchasing a mineral lease, they are expecting the mineto pay off. If a mine were successful duringthis time, purchasing the lease and agreeing to pay the tax would have been a fairly small expense compared to the profits that could be gained.
4. Why do you think the issuing of these leases would be "a matter of the greatest importance" to the community?
   
   
   
   
   Answer: The mining industry was beginning to be very profitable at this time, since the Mesabi Range was just beginning to be developed. The sale of mineral leases would open up the opportunities for more mining in the area, which would mean more jobs, more money, and more business for the shipping companies that transported the ore after it was mined.