30 CONFERENCE ON NATURAL BEAUTY 



agencies consciously builds into its activities an awareness of the 

 need to create rather than to destroy beauty. 



I recall and I think this is part of the ongoing programs I re- 

 call when I first went to the TVA in 1934 the eroding red clay hill- 

 sides of the Tennessee Valley were as ugly as they could be. They 

 were restored through the fertilizer plant that Secretary Freeman 

 mentioned, by revitalizing agriculture, by putting corn lands into 

 pasture. And this seems to me to be the way beauty must be 

 achieved. It can't be superimposed as a separate thing on the whole 

 Nation. It must be built into each of our ongoing programs. 



Senator Muskie made this point yesterday morning very effectively. 



Mr. PAUL. I would like to underline what you said, Mr. Secre- 

 tary. For example, in our case, we of course have a primarily 

 military mission. But we happen to control 27 million acres of 

 lands in this country which I believe, is roughly the size of New 

 England. 



Any means of dissipating the responsibilities away from the De- 

 fense officials, such as a military base commander, would be a very 

 bad thing. In fact, I think it would be completely unworkable. 

 I wish to underline what you said. 



Secretary CONNOR. A Federal agency, whether it is a council or 

 a separate department, can only do so much in a program of this 

 kind. So much depends upon local participation, and particularly 

 on the authority and programs at the State level. I think, therefore, 

 it would be a mistake to try to centralize all the authority in any one 

 Federal department. I think that the combination of authority that 

 we see among various Federal agencies and also at the State and 

 local levels gives us a most effective mechanism for action. 



Secretary FREEMAN. This is not a problem unique to outdoor 

 recreation or beauty. 



In the Department of Agriculture, we play a part in implementing 

 the programs of many Federal agencies in rural areas. We must 

 have maximum coordination to get the job done as effectively as 

 possible. 



So I will say as I have said before the thing to do is to establish 

 a goal, and then to keep the attention of people in all echelons within 

 each department focused on the importance of cooperation and 

 coordination. 



