The House Natural Resources Committee this morning passed legislation to overhaul mining regulations andguarantee retired union coal miners health care and pensions.Chairman Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.) saw his long-standing rewrite of the 1872 General Mining Act pass by a vote of21-13.The split was along party lines except for Rep. Steven Horsford (D-Nev.), who hails from the nation's tophardrock mining state, and Rep. Garret Graves (R-La.), who talked about treating public resources fairly.The "Hardrock Leasing and Reclamation Act," H.R. 2579, would create a leasing system for mining gold, copperand other hardrock commodities on public land, similar to that used for coal, oil and gas.
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