396 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



"Such agents should also be authorized and instructed, under the direction of 

 the Department of the Interior or the Department of Agriculture, to sell for 

 the United States, in order to sdtisfy the current local demand, timber from 

 the public lands under proper regulafion\s, and in doing so especially to see to 

 it that no large areas be entirely stripped of their timber, so cts not to preveent 

 the natural reneival of the forest. . . . (Italics are the author's.) 



"While such measures might be provided for by law without unnecessary de- 

 lay, I would also suggest that the President be authorized to appoint a com- 

 mission, composed of qualified persons, to study the laws and practices adopted 

 in other countries for the preservation and cultivation of forests, and to report 

 to Congress a plan for the same object applicable to our circumstances. 



"I am so deeply impressed with the importance of this subject, that I ven- 

 ture to predict, the Congress making efficient laws for the preservation of our 

 forests will be ranked by future generations in this country among its greatest 

 benefactors." 



As probably furtber indicating the zeal with which Carl Schurz, as 

 a cabinet officer, pursued this subject, it is interesting to note that this 

 report upon the matter was sufficiently pressed upon the attention of 

 the President to cause its recoinmendations to be made one of the 

 features of President Hayes' first annual message to Congress. We 

 find that message stating as follows : 



"I invite the attention of Congress to the importance of the statements and 

 suggestions made by the Secretary of the Interior, concerning the depredations 

 committed upon the timberlands of the United States,, and the necessity for the 

 preservation of the forests. It is believed that the measures taken in pursu- 

 ance of the existing law to arrest these depredations will be entirely successful 

 if Congress, by an appropriation for that purpose, renders their continued en- 

 forcement possible. The experience of other nations teaches us that a country 

 cannot be stripped of its forests with impunity, and we shall expose ourselves 

 to the gravest consequences unless the wasteful and improvident manner in 

 which the forests in the United States are destroyed be efifectually checked. I 

 earnestly recommend that the measures suggested by the Secretary of the In- 

 terior for the suppression of depredations on the public timberlands of the 

 United States, for the selling of timber from the public lands, and for the 

 preservation of forests, be embodied in a law ; and that, considering the urgent 

 necessity of enabling the people of certain states and territories to purchase 

 timber from the public lands in a legal manner which at present they can not 

 do, such a law be passed without unavoidable delay." 



This start-ofif, so early in the administration, left no room to doubt 

 that both the Commissioner of the General Land Office and the Sec- 

 retary of the Interior not only deemed it their duty to deal effectively 

 with depredators upon the public domain, but saw with equal clear- 

 ness the importance of securing a provident forest policy, shaped along 



