24 SEVENTH REPORT. 



I know that the questions here raised are difficult ones and I know 

 no panacea for all the wastes of the body politic. I might indeed sug- 

 gest that it seems to me that municipal or State ownership is too often 

 treated as of necessity synonymous with municipal and State opera- 

 tion and exploration. The Boston subway is a good illustration of 

 public ownership and private operation, which af>parently works better 

 there than would any other plan just now. I may perhaps remind you, 

 too, that in Mexico all mining is under a system of State leases, and 

 in Canada lumbering. In this commonwealth the policy has in general 

 been for the State to divest itself of the title to its lands, with their 

 resources, even though they could be sold only for a song, and were 

 mainly useful to be cut uj) into lots to be given away with ''free chick- 

 ens," thus to make work and fees in the process of title registering and 

 tax collecting. Even our State institutions of learning have largely 

 divested themselves of their landed wealth. Would not in many cases 

 a lease for fifty years or longer have been exactly as well? It is a fair 

 question, how far it is wise for a community to let its wealth go perma- 

 nently out of its own hands, and in particular into the hands of non- 

 residents. Non-resident property owners have been a source of friction 

 ever since the days of the nobleman who let out his vineyard to hus- 

 bandman and went into a far country. Harvard University years ago, 

 instead of selling Boston real estate outright, had a policy of letting 

 it on a 99 year lease. And of late every now and then a piece of prop- 

 erty, like the Adams house, worth a couple of hundred thousand re- 

 verts, and is a very welcome addition to their unrestricted funds. It 

 seems to me well worth while to consider w^hether it would not have 

 been, and even now be, a wise policy for the State and its land owning 

 institutions in regard to land not best suited for homesteads, to have 

 leased the lands for a term of years rather than deeded the property 

 outright. Certainlv a lot of land would have come back to them, and 

 kept off that maelstrom of useless expense, — the delinquent tax list. 

 While this I would merely suggest, what I w^ould urge is more careful 

 and intelligent consideration of our waning natural resources, so that 

 before they are gone we may develop substitute products and replacing 

 industries, and that their proceeds may go in part into permanent im- 

 provements, and additions to the wealth of the State, stone ro^ds re- 

 placing plank roads, stone or cement bridges Avooden bridges, stone or 

 cement dams wooden dams. 



But of all the wealth that Michigan has possessed I ask anyone to 

 find any that has been better spent for the permanent wealth of the 

 community than that which has been spent on educational institutions. 

 They produce intelligent citizens. They draw into the State an intelli- 

 gent public which spend much money at the time. Many of them stay 

 here to help build up the State. Their buildings and equipment will be 

 more and more Meccas and permanent objects of interest and attrac- 

 tion and resort. Their scientific researches will help to develop, to save, 

 and to replace our natural resources. 



I can picture in my mind two fortunes, and they will be but com- 

 posite photogra]»hs drawn from life. The one is built upon a reckless 

 cutting out of the choicest of lumber, none but the best taken, the 

 brush left around, and fired either purposely or fraudulently to conceal 

 theft. In the path of the first fires is left either a tangled mass of 



