484 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



paratively little land, except the farmer's 

 woodlot, which should be given to for- 

 estry, because quite all of it is well 

 adapted for agriculture, and should be 

 devoted to that purpose. Then, there 

 are some states whose financial re- 

 sources are so limited that no consid- 

 erable planting of forests and main- 

 taining them until maturity need be ex- 

 pected of them. It is unnecessary to 

 name these, but such is the fact, and 

 the truth is patent that no great amount 

 of forest restoration and ownership by 

 the state governments can be depended 

 upon. It is true, however, that there 

 are some states in which this can be 

 profitably undertaken, but there is a 

 limit even there. 



Take, for instance, our own state of 

 Pennsylvania, which is among those 

 best conditioned — if not the very best — 

 for the restoration of her forests and 

 conserving them in useful perpetuity 

 when restored. Her virgin forests are 

 nearly all gone, and will be practically 

 so within the next decade ; but were 

 there a million acres, she could not pur- 

 chase even one, for the law limits the 

 price to be paid by the state to $5 per 

 acre, and the value of such forests is 

 now not less than $50, and much of it 

 above $100. Whatever is done must be 

 done along the line of restoration on 

 cut-over and burned-over lands. There 

 are about 8,500,000 acres — practically 

 thirty per cent of the total area — of 

 non-agricultural land within her bor- 

 ders, and, mark you, it is not proposed 

 to devote land to forestry that it suit- 

 able for agriculture. While much of 

 this is in large bodies, and some owners 

 have large holdings, still a great pro- 

 portion of it is in possession of small 

 land owners. There is scarcely a farm 

 that does not contain some' of it, and 

 but few of such small tracts can be 

 secured by the state, except by the ex- 

 ercise of its right of eminent domain, 

 even were they desirable, and they cer- 

 tainly would not be if in small and de- 

 tached pieces. The state already owns 

 almost 1,000,000 acres of cut-over and 

 much of it burned-over land, and it is 

 constantly purchasing more. But there 

 is a limit to what it can as well as what 



it should do, for fully three-fourths of 

 what it now owns, or will be likely to 

 own, must be reforested by planting 

 trees, as has been found necessary in 

 European experience, in order to re- 

 store and maintain forests in perpe- 

 tuity. It is possible that the state can 

 secure, say, 2,000,000 acres, perhaps 

 more, but she should possess not less 

 than 6,000,000 to meet the demands of 

 her own citizens, and it is not probable 

 that so much can be obtained ; and that 

 would be only about forty-one per cent 

 of her total area, while Germany's for- 

 ests cover twenty-six per cent of the 

 empire's domain, and she imports one- 

 third of the forest products consumed 

 by her people, and her forests are far 

 more productive than ours. 



Thus it will be seen that the power 

 of the state governments to restore and 

 conserve the forests within their do- 

 main is, as in the case of the general 

 government, quite limited ; but, were 

 they not limited by prevailing condi- 

 tions which cannot be overcome, would 

 it be best for a state to own all or any 

 great portion of the forests within her 

 borders? If our government were of 

 a form in which there would be little 

 or no change of policy consequent upon 

 the triumph of one or the other of po- 

 litical parties, it would present a dif- 

 ferent case than now confronts us, when 

 a change of party control may come 

 every four years. As long as politics 

 can be kept out of forestry manage- 

 ment, all things may go along well ; but 

 who can depend upon or guess what 

 may happen in the realm of politics 

 when the forests become valuable? To 

 imagine they would not then become 

 the prey of the grafter and political 

 schemer would be no less absurd and 

 improbable than to believe the millen- 

 nium would then come. That the state 

 as well as the national government 

 should own and control enough forests 

 to at least prevent a monopoly through 

 a combination of private owners, must 

 not be denied ; but that either or both 

 should do all this is impossible, and 

 would be impracticable were it possible, 

 yet the claim advanced by some that 

 private interests should alone develop 



