FORESTRY MOVEMENT OF THE SEVENTIES 405 



the nature of things that where timber is taken from the pubHc lands without 

 restraint the process is attended with the most reckless waste. No attention is 

 paid to the preservation of young trees or of anything that is not immediately 

 used. What is looked upon as everybody's property is apt to be in nobody's 

 care. Thus, our forests are disappearing with appalling rapidity, especially in 

 those parts of the country where they will not renew themselves when once 

 indiscriminately destroyed. Like spendthrifts, we are living not upon the in- 

 terest but upon the capital. The consequences can easily be foreseen. They 

 will inevitably be disastrous, unless the Congress of the United States soon 

 wakes up to the greatness of the danger and puts this ruinous business upon 

 a different footing by proper legislaltion, either according to the principles ad- 

 vocated by this department and the Public Lands Commission, or upon others 

 that may be found equally effective. The action of the government will apply 

 only to the public lands; but those por'tions of the country in which the great 

 body of the public lands is situated stands most in need of speedy and ener- 

 getic action. I have considered it my duty to call attention to this subject upon 

 every proper occasion, and that duty has been performed. All further respon- 

 sibility will rest with the legislative branch of the government. It is to be 

 hoped that the voice of warning will be heeded before it is too late." 



With this significant challenge to Congress, Secretary Schurz closed 

 this record of his efforts to secure for his adopted country a national 

 administration of its forests. 



Viewed now in retrospect, from this distance, the whole incident 

 stands in clear relief as an epoch-making struggle, waged in behalf 

 of a cause then but little known, or heeded to any great extent except 

 by its opponents. So little headway had the movement made, in fact, 

 up to that time, that the bill drafted in the Interior Department may 

 be said to have fairly blazed the way in respect to submitting, for 

 action by Congres. a measure making provision for the administration 

 of our forests. Yet, so well did it do its work of outlining basic prin- 

 ciples that, in looking back upon it in the light of our present experi- 

 ence, it stands pre-eminently as the preliminary survey in our work 

 of laying out the lines of the policy ultimately adopted. Should any 

 doubt be entertained on this point, it will be well to measure that bill 

 against all others previously presented to Congres on the same general 

 subject of forest conservation, and then turn and compare it with 

 our present twentieth century concept of a working basis for a forest 

 policy. Carl Schurz's bill of the seventies stands the test. 



Acordingly, when later on in the nineties, the movement was in due 

 course brought to success and signalized a victory, it should be remem- 

 bered that it was not a victory of any one, but of many — a culminating 

 victory — shared in by one and all alike who, through the preceding 

 years, had taken a part in the slow-going process of molding popular 

 thought along the lines of the movement. 



And it may also be well to add in conclusion that when history- 

 making action, such as the above, has been imprinted upon the move- 

 ment by men of such stamp as Carl Schurz and James A. Williamson, 

 and moreover, in characters so vigorous and clear-cut as to fairly sil- 

 houette the two men upon the background of forestry, due recogni- 

 tion of such services undoubtedly constitutes a debt of honor. 



