THE INTERESTS VERSUS THE PEOPLE 



By THOMAS ELMER WILL 



I. AN ORGANIZED FIGHT 



THE issue is joined and the war 

 is on. 

 For years, the readers of this 

 magazine have been famihar with the 

 fight on the National Forest policy. At 

 regular intervals certain United States 

 Senators have made the welkin ring 

 with their onslaughts upon "Baron" 

 Pinchot and his "Western empire." 



Again and again sentiment and evi- 

 dence sufficient to pass a dozen ordinary 

 bills have been concentrated upon Con- 

 gress to secure the enactment of the 

 Appalachian bill, only to see it fail in 

 one house or the other. 



But the fight is not confined to the 

 forest policy. In Conservation for 

 August, the present writer pointed out 

 the hostility to the conservation policy 

 in general. 



Congress, though urged by the Presi- 

 dent, will not establish a national con- 

 servation commission. The President 

 appoints such a commission and asks 

 for it a paltry appropriation of $50,000, 

 but receives no response. 



Instead, Congressman James A. Taw- 

 ney, of Minnesota, appears with his 

 amendment to the Sundry Civil bill, 

 rushes it like lightning through both 

 houses, and behold, the Conservation 

 Commission, with numerous other simi- 

 lar and valuable bodies, is outlawed. 



All of which proves again that Con- 

 gress can enact legislation when it so 

 desires, but that it is discriminating as 

 to the character of legislation. 



Next, the Conservation Commission 

 comes forward with its epoch-making 

 report, but the House Committee on 

 Printing, Charles B. Landis, of Indiana, 

 chairman, refuses to report favorably 

 the Senate resolution providing for 



printing it. Finally, the Senate prints 

 a paltry 2,400 copies, chiefly for 

 members of the two houses, and a con- 

 gressional mailing list, and the report 

 is thereby virtually suppressed. 



What does it all mean? 



As Mr. Pinchot so well said at Spo- 

 kane, "The easiest way to hide a real 

 issue always has been, and always will 

 be, to replace it with a false one." 



But the real issue in this case shall 

 not be hidden. Let the facts testify. 



For years, the hostility to the forest 

 policy centered in Denver. It was 

 there that the Public Lands Convention 

 of June 18-20, 1907, was held. In 

 Denver a year later came another out- 

 burst of hostility to governmental 

 "great feudal estates," "paternalism," 

 "bureaucracy" and landlordism." 



In Denver there now exists "The 

 National Public Domain League," 

 with constitution and by-laws, member- 

 ship fee, office, press bureau and the 

 other paraphernalia of present-day prop- 

 aganda. 



The literature of this body is suffi- 

 ciently abundant to make plain its view- 

 point. That there may be no mistake 

 about this, typical extracts are here 

 given. 



On one occasion Mr. Pinchot seems 

 to have used the following very proper 

 language : 



"These reserves will be the remnant 

 of the vast empire that lay beyond the 

 Mississippi which can still be handed 

 down as a national heritage after all 

 the rest of the public lands worth hav- 

 ing have become private property." 



To the National Public Domain 

 League this expression operates as a 

 red rag flaunted in the face of an angry 

 bull. The sentence is quoted over and 



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