356 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



AN IMPOSSIBLE SITUATION 



On the other hand, the public has a very essential interest in the 

 question of keeping the lands in a producing condition so as to render 

 a maximum of service, in supporting industries and local communities, 

 and in serving to support through tax levies public enterprises of vari- 

 ous kinds. Even though the public has surrendered its direct owner- 

 ship of the timberlands, it cannot afford to permit them to be handled 

 in a way to be injurious to the welfare of the community. The various 

 benefits required of forests, from their products, support of industry, 

 etc., can be obtained only in part from the existing public forests. 

 They are not extensive enough or widely enough distributed to meet 

 more than a part of the public needs. We must continue to rely in 

 considerable part on private lands, both for present supplies and for 

 growing timber for the future. 



We have then a perplexing dilemma. On the one hand the public is 

 deeply concerned that the private forests be handled in a way to pro- 

 vide for forest renewal and growth. We have on the other hand 

 the timber owners struggling under a responsibility that has never 

 been fully sensed or accepted. The result is that while considerations 

 of public interests demand that something be done, nothing substantial 

 is actually being accomplished. It appears to me that the situation is 

 an impossible one, that cannot long continue. Both the industry and 

 the public have a definite decision to make. As I see it, either private 

 owners must assume the full responsibility of properly caring for their 

 timberlands, including protection and forest renewal ; or the public 

 must take over the responsibility that it once had and surrendered ; or. 

 the public must share with the owners both the responsibility and 

 the burden of securing the objectives that are essential to safeguard 

 the public welfare. IMy own view is that the last is the only fair and 

 practical method from the standpoint of all concerned. 



PROBLEMS RELATING TO PUBLIC FORESTS 



But there is a fourth group of problems. Not all of the forest lands 

 passed into private hands. When the policy of deeding away the 

 public timberlands was at last found to be an unsafe one for the 

 Nation, it was changed and the bulk of the remaining public timber- 

 lands were withdrawn from private appropriation and segregated as 

 National Forests. In this way about 155 million acres, nearly all in 

 the western mountains, were reserved. For these public timberlands 

 the public is doing what should also be done for the timberlands that 



