REVIEWS 647 



every public purpose unless some constitutional prohibition, either 

 Federal or State, has taken it away. I find no such prohibition. I 

 confess my inability to understand the reasoning which finds it in 

 that clause of the constitution which commands the legislature to levy 

 an annual tax to defray the estimated expenses of the State. The 

 power of taxation is one of the necessary attributes of sovereignty. To 

 say that, because the constitution makers thought best to make a 

 specific provision that taxes should be levied for certain purposes, they 

 intended thereby to interdict taxation for all other purposes, is to my 

 mind unthinkable. Besides, if aft'orestation and reforestation be public 

 purposes, then the moneys spent in carrying them on are necessarily 

 and properly expenses of the State and come within the constitutional 

 command. The expenses of a State include the moneys which it spends 

 in carrying out the public purposes which the legislative judgment 

 directs to be carried out. 



"Third, afforestation and reforestation of large areas are not 'works 

 of internal improvement' within the meaning of the constitution . . . 

 the term includes 'those things which ordinarily might, in human 

 experience, be expected to be undertaken for profit or benefit to the 

 property interests of private promoters, as distinguished from those 

 other things which primarily, and preponderantly merely facilitate the 

 essential functions of government.' . . 



"Now, I affirm that it is not to be expected in the light of human 

 experience, in this land at least, that the establishment and conserva- 

 tion of great forest areas for the public good should be undertaken 

 by private enterprise, and I also affinn my belief, as previously stated, 

 that such work is preeminently a public work, and hence one of the 

 essential functions of government. It has not been recognized as such 

 until recently, perhaps, but that is merely because the conditions which 

 make it such have only recently arisen and become acute. So in my 

 judgment every act which is necessary to be done in successfully 

 carrying on afforestation and reforestation, including the purchasing 

 of the necessary lands, may properly be done by the State. My orig- 

 inal opinion was that this might properly be done by the State. My 

 original opinion was that this might properly include the erection of 

 sawmills and the manufacture of lumber out of the timber which under 

 the rules of scientific forestry ought to be cut. but I yielded my opinion 

 on this point, and I stand by the concession." 



In various ways the State had become possessed of about 358,000 

 acres, of which around 160,000 acres had been purchased as forest 

 reserves at a total cost of somewhat over $548,000, and around 20,000 

 acres were Federal government grants for reforestation purchases. As 

 a result of the court decision, on all the lands acquired by the State 

 under the forestry laws, either by purchase or by tax deeds, the normal 

 school fund has now secured a lien and they are to be managed as 

 school fund lands, but the Conservation Commission, "having as a 



