584 



CONSER\'ATION 



The question is a most important one, and 

 a powerful fight will undoubtedly be made 

 by the rich timber and public-land thieves 

 of the country to discredit Mr. Pinchot and 

 to show that the action of Mr. Ballinger is 

 right and proper. The public lands of the 

 United States have been the source of scandal 

 and corruption from the beginning of the 

 Republic until now ; and as these lands grow 

 scarcer the struggle to acquire them by means 

 fair or foul — preferablj' foul, it seems — 

 grows fiercer and more desperate. 



It will be well for the country to keep a 

 sharp lookout on the efiforts now being made 

 to monopolize the Nation's water-power. — 

 Nczv Orleans (La.) States. August 15, 1909. 



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Too Serious to Be Ignored 



Mr. Pinchot's statement that a great water- 

 power trust is being formed is too serious a 

 matter to be dismissed lightly. Dismissing 

 him from office would be like the Oriental 

 custom of beheading the bearer of bad news 

 and then refusing to believe there was any 

 danger. — The Wall Street Jownal, August 

 16, 1909. 



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Pinchot's Object Right 



* * * It is certain that the policy which 

 Theodore Roosevelt carried out with much 

 success was inaugurated bv Gifford Pinchot 

 to the discomfort of public-land swindlers 

 all over the West and with the approval 

 of every honest citizen throughout the 

 country. 



* * * The burden of proof is upon tho 

 Secretary of the Interior to demonstrate that 

 the established policy of the Government, as 

 applied to the locality concerned, is wrong. 



There are vast areas of public lands whose 

 value the Government has not had time to 

 determine. Of 774,000,000 acres in the public 

 domain nearly seventy per cent is still un- 

 surveyed. Many of the tracts are known 

 to private interests to contain enormouslv 

 valuable deposits of minerals. Other area*- 

 vvill aflford splendid opportunity for irriga- 

 tion enterprises,_ as to which the Govern- 

 ment has a policy of its own and counter 

 to which private interests occasionally run. 

 Further than that, grazing and lumber 

 interests in not a few parts of the Northwest 

 have been deprived of pasturoge and privi- 

 leges that they formerly enjoyed with prac- 

 tically no compensation to the public treasury. 

 Finally, it is true, as the Chief Forester 

 claims, that the game of grab is being 

 played in desperate earnestness on the part 

 of syndicates bent on corralling water-power 

 locations on public lands. 



Against these forces Gifford Pinchot has 

 fought the fight of the people for fullv fif- 

 teen years. After such a service it oughl 

 to take a great quantity of proof to the con 

 trary to change popular confidence in him 

 as a faithful and fearless custodian of the 

 national forests. * * * Secretary Ballinger 



by adhering to a narrow interpretation of 

 the law seems in effect to speak for local 

 interests and for private parties, in con- 

 trast with the national interest represented 

 in a policy of conservation and careful valu 

 ation of resources before the people, through 

 the Government, should part with this por- 

 tion of their national heritage. 



There is apparently no need of haste in 

 alienating public property to private owner 

 ship under the circumstances. In the ad- 

 ministration of its forest reservations the 

 policy of the past has proved eminently sat- 

 isfactory as a matter of public housekeeping. 

 No amount of pressure or intimidation, no 

 matter who its spokesman may be, should 

 cause the Government custodians of the pub- 

 lic forests to abate one jot or tittle from the 

 strict spirit of the established policv to dis- 

 pose of the public lands only so fast as 

 the development of the communities in which 

 they are located may really justify. If the 

 law has really been strained to establish 

 the policy, then the law should immediately 

 be amended to give the proper authorities 

 full power to protect the public interest. Mr. 

 Pinchot, in his aims at least, should have 

 unqualified support. — The Wall Street Jour- 

 nal, August 14, 1909. 



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Congress Should Investigate 



It appears that to the water-power issue 

 Secretary Ballinger has added another by his 

 declaration of hostility to further irrigation 

 schemes in the West, a fact that has greatly 

 stirred the people of that section, because it 

 is generally recognized that the development 

 of the arid lands will result in enor- 

 mous benefit to the whole country. Moreover, 

 the present controver.sy has resulted in the 

 airing of questionable if not scandalous coal- 

 land transactions in Alaska, and it is quite 

 certain that the enemies of Mr. Ballinger 

 will cause all the facts in connection witl? 

 these transactions to be uncovered by a con- 

 gressional investigation. 



It is alleged that these lands contain coal 

 to the value of $250,000,000 and that the Mor- 

 gan-Guggenheim interests are seeking to get 

 their grip on the properties which are re- 

 garded as almost indispensable for the wel- 

 fare of the Northwest. However, it is evi- 

 dent that the Ballinger-Pinchot dispute which 

 started over the water-power sites has grown 

 to larger and more serious proportions, in- 

 volving the whole policy of conservation 

 which the Roosevelt administration did so 

 much to promote. 



It is obvious that President Taft should 

 at once inquire thoroughly into this matter. 

 — New Orleans (La.") States. August 16, 

 1909. 



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The Law and the Spirit 



Secretary Ballinger's declaration that he 

 wants everything done according to law and 

 not personal caprice sounds well enough. 



