There was, however, one unfortunate indirect effect. In view of the difference of opinion among congressmen as to whether Congress had or had not intended to make the limitations to the Public Land Act relative to areas which could be sold applicable to friar lands the secretary of war issued an executive order providing that their sale should be subject to such limitations, pending an expression by Congress of its will in the matter. Congress has never acted. There are large tracts of vacant friar lands which cannot be sold for years to come, if subject to existing restrictions, either because they are situated in very sparsely inhabited regions where there is no demand for them on the part of would-be small landowners, or because the price as fixed by law is materially in excess of that of equally good, adjacent, unoccupied public lands which can be had subject to identical conditions as to areas purchasable. As the Philippines are "land poor," the inadvisability of such a policy would seem to be sufficiently evident. The argument against large estates is without force, both because the amount of land concerned is relatively insignificant, and because there are already in the islands so many large estates, owned in many instances by Filipinos, that the addition of a few new ones more or less would not perceptibly change the existing situation. The question might well be raised as to the authority of the secretary of war to suspend by an executive order the operation of a law duly enacted by the Philippine legislature pursuant to powers conferred by Congress, especially as Congress has power, and has had opportunity, to disapprove it. I think it possible that the director of lands could be compelled by mandamus to sell vacant friar lands in any quantity to an individual applicant. The facts as regards forest lands are set forth in sufficient detail in the chapter on the Philippine forests. The existing legislation relative to mineral lands is defective, or objectionable, in several minor particulars, but on the whole is reasonably satisfactory except for the provision that a person may locate but one claim on a given vein or lode. Such a provision would have very greatly hampered the development of the mining industry in the United States and it greatly hampers it in the Philippines. Recommendations that Congress amend the law relative to mining claims have been persistently made by the commission and have been persistently ignored, probably for the reason that Congress is too busy with other matters to give much attention to such requests from the Philippines.