74 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



paid for out of local treasuries at the 

 time of the Louisiana Purchase, but out 

 of tlie National Treasury, which the 

 states of the Atlantic seaboard exclu- 

 sively had helped to fill. 



New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Nevada, 

 and California came into the Nation as 

 the price of the blood shed during the 

 war with Mexico almost entirely by sol- 

 diers drawn from the South and East. 

 The money taken from the National 

 Treasury to pay the bills of that war 

 had been put there by the very states 

 which certain sectionalists now sav 

 should be deprived of any attention on 

 the part of the National Government. 



It is true that the extensive forest 

 reserves in the We^-t were taken out 

 of the National domain, but who paid 

 for the national domain, and reserved 

 these lands for the local benefit of the 

 new states? Was it not the very states 

 who then composed the Union, the very 

 states whom the new sectionalism wouUl 

 now cut off from receiving a small part 

 of benefits such as they have been given. 



The West is asking wisely and rightly 

 for National expenditure for irrigation 

 which directly benefits not a single 

 eastern state. Not one eastern news- 

 paper has been so mean or so narrow 

 as to suggest that the individual states 

 that directly benefit by it should pay the 

 1)ill. The states of this Union are sup- 

 posed to be united, and the Atlantic 

 slope gladly sees its burden increased 

 Ijy the diversion of one source of Na- 

 tional revenue to the removal of the 

 deserts in any part of our common 

 country. 



Is this a time for the West to refuse 

 the East when the East, in lier turn. 

 asks National help that stream-flow and 

 water supplies shall be preserved for 

 the East through National Forest Re- 

 serves, as thev are being created for the 

 West by National expenditure for irri- 

 gation ? 



This is one country. The South to- 

 day strikes hands with the North on 

 this f[uestion of forest reserves and 

 agrees to the square deal. The West 

 has already received from National ex- 

 penditure forest reserves. It is seek- 

 ing more expenditure out of the Na- 



tional Treasury for permanent water 

 supply for its arid plains. It is unbe- 

 hevable that' any great body of men or 

 newspapers in the West will perma- 

 nently deny to the South and North 

 ec|uality of consideration and treatment. 



All parts of the United States equally 

 deserve National attention. As the pro- 

 tection of our coasts demands a Pa- 

 cific, a Gulf, and an Atlantic fleet, so 

 the conservation of our National re- 

 sources, if it is to be promoted in Col- 

 orado, California, and Alaska, should 

 be promoted also in the Carolinas, in 

 N'irginia, in New Hampshire, and in 

 Massachusetts. 



Whatever develops any part of our 

 country is for the benefit of every 

 American. The states that are asking 

 for Appalachian Forest Reserves are 

 merely asking for themselves what they 

 have already gladly helped to give 

 others. For the first time in our his- 

 tory the governors of South Carolina 

 and of Massachusetts have stood side 

 by side before the committees of Con- 

 gress in this appeal for simple justice 

 and common equity. 



If the maintenance of National Forest 

 Reserves is a wise National policy, that 

 policy should be indeed National and 

 no longer sectional in its scope. The 

 first American army assembled under 

 the pine-tree flag at Cambridge. The 

 first American navy flew the pine-tree 

 flag of New England. To-day the men 

 from imdcr the pine and palmetto stand 

 together as they stood m those earlier 

 days when the southern riflemen fol- 

 lowed Morgan to the seige of Boston, 

 as they stood when northern infantry 

 followed the Rhode Islan 1 blacksmith 

 to fight in Georgia and the Carolinas. 

 beside Marion and his men. against a 

 common foreign enemy. 



We turn to our brothers beneath the 

 shade of the button-wood, the willow, 

 and the redwood and in memory of the 

 flag under wdiose folds Americans first 

 joined in uprising for a common coun- 

 try, we ask protection for the tree that 

 was the first emblem of our liberty — 

 we ask justice ; not favoritism, but even- 

 handed justice alike to the land of the 

 ])almetto and the pine. 



