152 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



M 



arc! 



present civilization may be ( and it 

 certainly is close) it is destined to be 

 vastly closer in the comparatively near 

 future. 



Now all this as a Nation we have 

 consistently and steadily overlooked. 

 We are very much in the position of 

 a man adrift in an open boat on the 

 ocean. He has provisions and water for 

 ten days. He does not know whether he 

 will get any more. He does not know 

 whether he wall be picked up or not. 

 The average man with his individual 

 intelligence conserves his water and 

 his food, eats and drinks as little as 

 he can, making it last to the very ulti- 

 mate point, stinting himself to the 

 verge or over the verge of weakness. 

 This is for the sake of coming th 'ough 

 alive. As a Nation ^ve have adopted 

 the other policy. It is as though the 

 man in the open boat had said : "All 

 my life I have had three square meals 

 a day ; all my life I have had every- 

 thing I needed to eat and drink ; I 

 have no experience of the other condi- 

 tion ; my one way of judging the fu- 

 ture is by the past ; I have always had 

 three meals a day in the past and I al- 

 ways will have in the future. I will 

 eat my provisions as fast as I want, 

 and let the future take care of itself." 

 That is the exact and unexaggerated 

 condition of the public mind on all 

 these questions until a very recent 

 time. 



Now we are about to turn over a new 

 leaf. Under the foresighted and won- 

 derfully intelligent leadership of the 

 President this Nation is about to say 

 to itself: We have an inheritance. Let 

 us talk about it. What shall we do 

 about it ? We have no right to destroy 

 the prosperity of our children by the 

 way we make our own prosperity now. 

 Let us consider the three million 

 square miles that we have, and let us 

 make the best, the most intelligent, the 

 most farsighted use of it that is possi- 

 ble. That is statesmanship. That is 

 community intelligence, national in- 

 telligence, and that is the only point of 

 view which will save us from the fate 

 that has overtaken so many other na- 

 tions. 



We find ourselves in America in a 

 new situation. Alanv of the old laws 



which applied to the nations of Europe 

 no longer apply to us ; many of the 

 conditions which surrounded them are 

 different from those that surround us ; 

 and it is quite natural that we should 

 have said to ourselves, in substance, 

 (mind you I mean by thoughtlessness 

 as well as by direct intention) the fate 

 that has overtaken the other nations 

 that have destroyed their resources 

 will not apply to us, we are more in- 

 telligent, we are more effective, we 

 handle ourselves better, we know bet- 

 ter how to make use of the things that 

 we have. That is true ; but natural 

 laws apply to us as they do to North 

 Africa, and just as surely as this new 

 point of view fails (if it should fail) 

 to determine the attitude of the Amer- 

 ican people toward the continent on 

 which they live, just so surely the 

 same result will follow. 



I myself believe confidently that no 

 such result will follow. I believe the 

 change has been made. In my experi- 

 ence in public life, which is not long, 

 there has been no single subject taken 

 up so rapidly and so vigorously as the 

 combined subjects of waterway im- 

 provement and the conservation of 

 natural resources. And as we move 

 forward to the use of our streams, the 

 use of our soils, of our minerals, our 

 lands, our forests, approaching the 

 combined subject along different lines, 

 we are gradually getting together a 

 bodv of intelligent public sentiment 

 which is beginning to develop, and 

 which ultimately will develop a power 

 that cannot be withstood. ]\Iany 

 things we are now on the verge of 

 getting, which have seemed hopeless 

 for a long time ; but the great essential 

 fact, the fact that this Association 

 ought to rejoice in more than in any 

 other single thing, is that the policy of 

 foresight for which the American For- 

 estry Association has stood for years, 

 with regard to forest resources, and 

 which is the center of its work, has 

 gone over into the fields of other re- 

 sources as well, and we are now about 

 to see a new sight in the world — a Na- 

 tion intelligently, foresightedly. .'uid 

 determinedlv making the best possible 

 use, both for the present and the fu- 

 ture, of all its natural resources. 



