FORESTRY MOVEMENT OF THE SEVENTIES, IN THE 

 INTERIOR DEPARTMENT, UNDER SCHURZ 



By Jeannie S. Peyton 



Law Compiler, U. S. Forest Service 



Running back fifty years or more, to the early days of the forestry 

 movement in this country, it is interesting to note that it was con- 

 temporaneous with considerable legislative activity in respect to timber 

 on the public domain, initiated and spurred on by interests other than 

 the timber conservationists of that day. Such activities, at least as 

 they are revealed by the statute books and the histories based thereon, 

 were undoubtedly pernicious. So much so, in fact, that that period, 

 viewed from the standpoint of our timber interests, has come to be 

 regarded as almost wholly and hopelessly bad. Yet such was 'not al- 

 together the case, for those were not the only public timber activi- 

 ties of that time, nor were they by any means the most important, even 

 though they may have left a more indelible impress on the statute 

 books, and also on the public mind. Concurrent, therewith, in point 

 of time, but running wholly in the opposite direction, were other leg- 

 islative efforts — those of the conservationists — made in behalf of a 

 provident timber policy. These activities, while they failed for a time, 

 were, notwithstanding, none the less noteworthy for that reason, since, 

 when measured rightly, the failures of any movement, particularly 

 those suffered during the period of its inception, are frequently not 

 less important than the success which marks its final achievement, and 

 for which they usually pave the way. All who fought and lost in 

 those early days of struggle to establish the movement undoubtedly 

 won honors and deserve to share with those whose good fortune it was 

 to fight later on and see the cause crowned with success. It is with 

 the purpose of bringing more fully to light, and giving to it due place 

 and prominence in the history of our forestry movement, that the 

 stirring clash with the enemies of forestry which took place in the 

 Interior Department when Carl Schurz sat in the Cabinet, is here 

 chronicled. 



Granted that the Interior Department and its Ciencral Land Oftice 

 did during this very period, as well as subsequently, function under 



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