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AMERICAN FORESTRY 



Mated. An annual appropriation, not 

 exceeding $25,000, is made for the ex- 

 penses of the commission and its mem- 

 bers. 



These are the provisions of the act 

 in outline. It will be noticed that it 

 nowhere mentions any specific localities 

 in which such forests are to be ac- 

 quired. It is, therefore, an act of gen- 

 eral, national application and its spe- 

 cial application to the two Appalachian 

 areas is simply due to the fact that they 

 are known to be the most important 

 forest regions in the East for the pur- 

 poses of this act. It is believed by 

 many of the best friends of the South- 

 ern Appalachian and White Mountains 

 that a broad, national measure of this 

 kind is better than one that is specific, 

 and this is certainly true as far as gen- 

 eral principles of legislation are con- 

 cerned. As originally introduced in the 

 Sixtieth Congress, and as it passed the 

 House in that Congress, the Weeks 

 Bill had a duration of nine years in- 

 stead of five. We believe that it was 

 better in that form and that a period 

 of time as long as nine years is needed 

 to demonstrate in the most complete 

 manner the need and value of these 

 forests for national purposes. The 

 change was probably made in order to 

 facilitate the passage of the bill through 

 Congress, and in the belief, which we 

 hope is well founded, that within five 

 years its usefulness would have been 

 sufficiently demonstrated to establish 

 the policy. 



Whatever differences of opinion there 

 may be upon special features of the 

 bill, it must be remembered that it is 

 the product of the careful study of some 

 of the ablest men in the House of Rep- 

 resentatives, and that they have also 

 consulted with some of the senators 

 who have been particularly interested in 

 this measure, and that the bill is the form 

 of legislation which they believe to be 

 most practicable. It is, therefore, nec- 

 essary that all friends of the great ob- 

 ject towards which this bill is directed 

 should put their shoulders to the wheel 

 in the united effort to push it through 

 to the long-sought goal. 



The Report of Mr, Moore 



THE translation from the Revue des 

 Eaux et Forets of Paris, which is 

 published elsewhere in these pages, 

 is of peculiar interest at this time be- 

 cause it reviews the work and conclu- 

 sions of some of the French and Ger- 

 man investigators who were cited mis- 

 takenly, we believe, to support some 

 of the contentions of Mr. Willis L. 

 Moore, the Chief of the Weather Bu- 

 reau, in his recent report on the influ- 

 ence of forests on climate and on floods. 

 It appears from this French review of 

 the discussions of the Milan confer- 

 ence, as well as from the testimony of 

 Professor Swain at the hearing before 

 the Committee on Agriculture on the 

 25th of February, that the judgment of 

 the foreign investigators is practically 

 unanimous in opposition to the posi- 

 tion taken by Mr. Moore and some of 

 the army engineers. Next month we 

 shall publish in American Forestry 

 a symposium by some of our best Amer- 

 ican authorities dealing with Mr. 

 Moore's report. 



The attention that has been given to 

 this somewhat remarkable document is 

 out of all proportion to its scientific 

 value, but when a man who is known 

 as the Chief of the United States 

 Weather Bureau issues such a report 

 upon a subject that is of vital interest 

 to the whole country, and that bears 

 upon many of its most important ques- 

 tions, the public as a whole is likely 

 to estimate the statement by the posi- 

 tion held by its author, without a close 

 examination of his authority, his (luali- 

 fications to judge of the subject in 

 hand, or the scientific accuracy of his 

 reasoning. On these points it may be 

 said that whatever position may be ac- 

 corded the Chief of the Weather lUi- 

 reau as a meteorologist, he has not 

 qualified in any respect as a physiog- 

 rapher or as a forest engineer, and the 

 men who have so qualified have a right 

 to contradict his conclusions, as they 

 almost unanimously do. Mr. Moore 

 consciously and intentionally considers 



