REFLECTIONS OF A LIFE DIRECTOR 459 



But the really big controversial issues such as National Parks have 

 been scrupulously steered clear of. Now. after five years, when the 

 public through other agencies has awakened to the perils confronting 

 the National Parks, and are united on a program, the Association may 

 and probably will join the procession. This issue was thoroughly 

 explained to the President on January 15, 1917, and has not changed 

 since then. 



The tremendous issue involved in protecting Alaskan resources from 

 ruin at the hands of private exploiters, involving as it were the very 

 basic principles of conservation, was fully explained to the officers of 

 the Association some five years ago, but no effort has been made to 

 handle the subject and it will be fought out without the aid of the 

 American Forestry Association, since, as Dr. Drinker states, it is 

 controversial in character and this Association must take no side in 

 a controversy as to whether the public or private interests shall prevail. 



The fight to establish a quarantine against imported plant diseases, 

 which have wiped out the chestnut and threatened the white pine with 

 destruction, was put squarely up to the Association, which evaded the 

 issue on the grounds that its officers did not wish to oft'end the officials 

 of the Department of Agriculture. The quarantine was secured with- 

 out their aid. Discussions of the Snell Bill and other proposed legis- 

 lation by the Board of Directors revealed a state of vacillation and 

 uncertainty as to this legislation, but after practically all the interests 

 in the country had lined up behind it except those w^ho favored much 

 more drastic regulation, the Association was induced to climb aboard 

 and is now advocating this bill. Leadership on forest policy or legis- 

 lation can not longer be expected from the American Forestry Associa- 

 tion under the form or organization adopted or the personnel of its 

 governing body. 



PART VIII — THE FORESTERS AND THE AMERICAN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION. 



The most astonishing development of this entire situation is the 

 attitude taken by President Pack and Secretary Ridsdale toward the 

 body of men who have entered the profession of forestrj- and have 

 since its first beginnings in this country devoted themselves unselfishly 

 and wholeheartedly to pubHc service. Yet this attitude is recognized 

 as a measure of self-protection, growing directly out of the fact that 

 such eff'orts as have been put forth to oppose the dangerous tendencies 



