296 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



the conservation of natural resources. Acceding to the request, the 

 president has invited all the governors of states and territories (each 

 with three advisers) to convene in the White House in May next and 

 discuss ways and means of conserving the waters and other resources 

 of the country with him and with those cabinet officers, justices of the 

 supreme court, senators, and representatives whose duties may permit 

 attendance — and nearly all the executives have already accepted and 

 named their coadjutors. 



So the events of the young century strikingly duplicate those 

 immediately succeeding American Independence : Again questions of 

 commerce and interstate relations have become paramount — and in 

 multiplied magnitude and complexity; again it has become necessary 

 to take stock of those material possessions on which the perpetuity of 

 our people must depend — though now the possessions comprise not 

 only the land areas contemplated by the founders but the still greater 

 values residing in waters and woods and mines and soils, which were 

 inchoate then but have come into actuality and dominance through 

 the natural growth and orderly development of the nation; again it 

 seems necessary for a waterways commission to appeal from its own 

 court to an interstate conference representing that highest tribune, the 

 poeple — though now the appeal can not result in a federal constitution 

 (which came from the former in such perfection as to meet all later 

 needs), yet can hardly fail to bring about a closer readjustment of 

 the magnified sovereignties and multiplied possessions developed on 

 that fundamental platform. The president has expressed the feeling 

 that the May conference promises to be one of the most important 

 assemblages in our history; and the people and the press have con- 

 curred with a unanimity seldom evoked, and giving assurance that the 

 anticipation will be realized. 



Nor is it to be forgotten that in advocating the development of 

 our natural channels of commerce, Eoosevelt is but following the foot- 

 steps of Washington and Jefferson, and Eoot but treading the path 

 blazed by his early predecessor Gallatin; though they are supported 

 in cabinet, notably by the progressive Secretaries Garfield and Wilson, 

 far more vigorously than were the pioneers — indeed, never before have 

 a people and an administration been so firmly united in efforts to 

 improve an " oppressed and degraded state of commerce " with the 

 attendant conditions of national prosperity. 



The Need for Navigation 



The most pressing demand of the day connected with our inland 

 waterways is for navigation and carriage of freight. The need is 

 urgent. The notably reserved and cautious Interstate Commerce Com- 

 mission has just declared: 



