ERNEST S. GRIFFITH 17 



urgency by the necessity of balancing values under a now obvious 

 population pressure. Much of this approach had previously crystal- 

 lized in New York State where, by constitutional amendment in 1 894, 

 its forest preserve was to be kept "forever wild." The Adirondacks 

 and the Catskills to this day reflect the continuing and broadened pop- 

 ular support of this policy. More recently, Maine, California, and 

 Michigan have joined New York in recognizing the values of primi- 

 tive wilderness; while a whole procession of states has undertaken 

 the development of systems of state parks for various types of out- 

 door recreation. 



The shadow and eventually the substance of the Great War directed 

 the nation's attention to its growing scarcities, and at its end added 

 uranium and atomic materials to the category of basic resources. 

 Agriculture resumed its expansion as the bread basket for much of 

 the free world. The use of oil was stepped up enormously. Some 

 thought they saw clearly the often proclaimed but elusive end of 

 domestic oil production by the usual drilling. We are now more fully 

 aware that the precise date was and is debatable. Nineteen hundred 

 and forty-four saw a response to this threat in the passage of the 

 Synthetic Liquid Fuels Act, which authorized demonstration projects 

 of the feasibility of use of oil shale, of which we possessed enormous 

 quantities. However, private exploration and development of alter- 

 native foreign sources was the more immediate effective response in 

 petroleum, and also in iron ore and strategic metals generally. De- 

 fense stockpiling and exploration under the auspices of the Muni- 

 tions Board prior to World War II had brought but meagre results. 

 The National Security Resources Board of 1947 and its successors 

 instituted long-range programs of stockpiling and planning under the 

 aegis of national defense. The first atomic energy act was passed in 

 1946 — largely to establish an institutional base for further policy 

 development. Efforts to amend the write-off tax provisions of our min- 

 ing and drilling interests in favor of the general taxpayer were met in 

 part by the strengths of the mining interests. However, there was also 

 a sense that, as many of these resources became scarcer within the 

 borders of the United States and our dependence on overseas sources 

 grew, it was all the more important to place a premium on domestic 

 exploration and development. Of this same character was the transfer 



