Vol. XV 



SEPTEMBER, 1909 



No. 9 



HOME^BUILDING FOR THE NATION 



By GIFFORD PINCHOT, United States Forester, and Chairman 

 National Conservation Commission* 



THE most valuable citizen of this 

 or any other country is the man 

 who owns the land from which 

 he makes his living. No other man 

 has such a stake in the country. No 

 other man lends such steadiness and 

 stability to our national life. There- 

 fore, no other question concerns us 

 more intimately than the question of 

 homes. Permanent homes for our- 

 selves, our children, anfl our Nation — 

 this is the central problem. The policy 

 of national irrigation is of value to the 

 Tnited States in very many ways, but 

 the greatest of all is this, that national 

 irrigation multiplies the men who own 

 the land from which they make their 

 living. The old saying. "Who ever 

 heard of a man shouldering his gun to 

 fight for his boarding-house?" reflects 

 this great truth, that no man is so 

 ready to defend his country, not only 

 with arms, but with his vote, and his 

 contribution to ])ublic opinion, as the 

 man with a permanent stake in it — as 



the man who owns the land from which 

 he makes his living. 



Our country began as a nation of 

 farmers. During the periods that gave 

 it its character, when our independ- 

 ence was won and when our Union 

 was preserved, we were preeminently a 

 nation of farmers. A\'e cannot, and wc 

 ought not, to continue exclusively, or 

 even chiefly, an agricultural country, 

 because one man can raise food 

 enough for man^■. Rut the farmer who 

 owns his land is still the backbone of 

 this Nation ; and one of the things wc 

 want most is more of him. 



The man on the farm is valuable to 

 the Nation, like any other citizen, just 

 in proportion to his intelligence, char- 

 acter, ability, and patriotism ; but, un- 

 like the other citizens, also in propor- 

 tion to his attachment to the soil. That 

 is the principal spring of his steadi- 

 ness, his sanit}', his simplicity and di- 

 rectness, and man\- of his other desir- 



^Delivered before the Nationril Trri.q-ation Congress at Si)okanc, Wash., on August 10, 1909. 



521 



