Comment. 787 



ploiting but actually managing these resources. The men who 

 are pioneering in these woods certainly deserve our admiration; 

 they have giants' work before them ! 



The failure of the enemies of conservation in general and of 

 the Forest Service in particular to bring about the passage, in 

 the last Congress, of an amendment to the Agricultural Appro- 

 priation Bill requiring classification of all lands "fit and suitable 

 for agriculture" within the National forests, eliminates, tempo- 

 rarily, a serious menace to National forest administration. The 

 iniquity of the proposed measure requiring the elimination of 

 lands locally considered or alleged to be agricultural, has been 

 pointed out by Mr. Graves and others, and it is entirely clear to 

 those familiar with the situation that the existing laws are quite 

 ample to take care of the classification and elimination of lands 

 which are truly agricultural. 



It is to be hoped that the question of agricultural classification 

 will not come up again, but in the meantime another danger 

 threatens the National forests. This new menace is a proposal 

 to turn the National forests over to the individual states, and there 

 seems to be a strong movement to bring this about, fathered by 

 interests which would prefer to have the natural resources of the 

 country open to private control and exploitation rather than under 

 efficient National management. It is unpleasant to anticipate 

 what would happen if the timber, coal, mineral, grazing and other 

 resources of the public lands were placed in the power of the 

 political machines in various states. Aside from the menace 

 which would follow under such a policy it is evident that the 

 States, even if sincerely and honestly desirous of properly manag- 

 ing these lands, do not have the organization nor experience to 

 handle property representing such diversified conditions and of 

 such enormous value. In the first place, many of the adminis- 

 trative problems are national, among these being fire protection, 

 insect control and matters relating to water in the form of stor- 

 age, flood damage and irrigation. The States also lack the finan- 

 cial resources to properly develop and protect large areas of forest 

 land and do not have the broad viewpoint which reconciles present 

 use and the perpetuation of important resources. Entirely aside 



