MICHIGAN ROADS AND FORESTS. 



13 



on. and is almost universally followed by fires. 

 This condition is hastened by : 



(a) High prices. 



(b) Low figures at which most forest was 

 obtained "did not cost much." 



(c) Peculiarity of general business conditions; 

 aversion to safe investment at a low per cent. 



(d) Pernicious effect of state action in, first, 

 taxation ; and. second, protection (or, rather, lack 

 of protection) of all rural property, and espe- 

 cially forests. This latter is well illustrated in 

 Michigan by the assessment at cash value of all 

 property ; but the tax rate is left to local people, 

 without any control or limit, so that the average 

 tax rate in one county in 1901 was $63 for every 

 $1,000 of property. At the same time the state 

 had never expended one dollar to enforce its laws 

 in giving these forest properties fire or other 

 protection. Thus men feel forced to cut and then 

 leave the land to revert for taxes. 



:>. Consumption of timber. About 40,000,- 

 iKiii.OOO feet of material besides firewood and stuff 

 used on farms. We us'e about five times as much 

 as the people of Germany or France. Our liberal 

 consumption is a vital part of our rapid develop- 

 ment in all directions. Even if we reduce this 

 to one-half, our forests will not be able to grow 

 the timber we use ! 



Action to Improve Conditions. 



(So far adopted.) 



1. Since 1873 Congress has legislated in favor 

 of forestry. In 1880 the first census of forest 

 wealth was taken. In 1886 the Department of 

 Agriculture established a forestry division. 



2. In 1891 Congress authorized the President 

 tn -et aside forest reserves. Since then all presi- 

 dents have done so, and today over 160,000,000 

 acres are so set aside, and all Congresses have 

 approved this work. We have today national 

 forests and a regular United States service caring 

 for these forests. 



3. New York has a state reserve of about 

 1.. ".00.000 acres purchased and is holding and im- 

 proving this. 



4. Pennsylvania has nearly one million acres 

 of cut-nver. devastated forest land, and is buying 

 more all sTie can get for $5 or less per acre. 



5. Wisconsin has declared all her state lands 

 forest reserves. There is a state forester and a 

 service is being organized. 



6. Various states have state foresters, \n., 

 Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maryland, Georgia, 

 Wisconsin. Minnesota, California, Washington; 

 and forest commissions, charged with duties 

 from mere propaganda' to aid work and actual 

 forest administration, Pennsylvania, New 

 York and Michigan. 



7. A number of states have forestry education 

 1>y tlie state at schools and colleges. 



8. Several states have been and are now re- 

 liating taxes on forest plantations, and in a few 

 cases an actual bonus was paid in money or land 

 to encourage forest planting. 



9. Special laws for the protection of forests, 

 especially against fire, and also fire warden sys- 

 tems to tight forest fires, exist in a number of 

 states. 



10. At least two states, Massachusetts and 

 Pennsylvania, have taken up officially the matter 

 of forest taxation. 



11. The United States, in its national forests; 

 New York, in its reserves, and so also Pennsyl- 

 vania, are today paying local taxes, acknowledg- 

 ing the principle of universal taxation as applied 

 to state forest property. This is a very important 

 point, as state tax-dodging is the only reasonable 

 argument against state forests at present. 



12. The sentiment in favor of forestry is very 

 extensive, and has induced many persons and 

 organizations of power and influence to come 

 forward in demands for further action. It is safe 

 to say that by far the majority of our people 

 favor action, and that active, actual opposition 

 is very limited, and generally comes only from 

 persons who are interested in busmess ways 



;my changes of land and forest laws. 



Important Conditions Inimical to Forestry in 

 the United States. 



1. United States land laws, notably 

 is the Timber and Stone Act of 1878, which 

 enables people to alienate United States forest 

 lands under false pretenses at $2.50 per acre. 

 This latter law was enacted under the (false) 

 pretense of helping the settler, but in actual prac- 

 tice has been the means of gathering many mil- 

 lions of acres of valuable forests in the hands 

 of lumber and timber companies, where they are 

 now beyond control and in process of devastation 

 and denudation. 



2. State laws, such as exist in Michigan, which 

 operate on the principle that it is for the best 

 interest of the state and people to get all lands 

 into private hands and on the tax list. Michigan 

 has held from one-third to one-half of the north 

 half of fhe state "in soak" for taxes ever since 

 1875, and she spent over $1,500.000 in ten years, 

 ending in 1905, trying to get rid of these lands. 

 Michigan has sold lancLfot ten cents per acre 

 and upward for years, and at the "clearance sale" 

 of 1881 sold lands for as little as $1 per forty 

 acres (description) ; and she has sold in the last 

 five years nearly a million acres at an average 

 price of about $1.20 per acre, though it is, and was, 

 well known that most of this is bought for the 

 remnant of timber, and is skinned and devastated 

 further, and normally left to revert for taxes. 



3. Lack of protection for cut-over lands and 

 forest. While laws exist forbidding fires, and 

 while in some states a so-called fire-warden sys- 

 tem exists, it is still a fact that in not one staje 

 is there really an effective protective system. 



4. Unreasonable taxation and excessive taxa- 

 tion for the very districts and properties least 

 able to stand this treatment. In the United States 

 generally we do the following : 



(a) Assess standing timber (forester's crop) 

 as real estate. The farmer pays tax on land and 

 improvements, never on his crop. And his crop 

 escapes taxation quite generally, even after it 

 leaves him. Wheat and meat are eaten before 

 next assessment time, etc. The forester pays on 

 land and crop. More than that. If he plants 

 in 1900, the growth of the season 1910 is the 

 real crop of 1910. This crop is assessed and 

 taxed in 1911, 1912, etc., until 1980, when it is 

 harvested. The same is done with each year's 

 crop, because the assessor will, naturally, increase 

 the assessment as the trees grow larger. But this 

 is exactly as if the farmer paid taxes on land 

 and crop of this year and all the crops of many 

 years past. 



(b) The local (principal) tax rate is fixed by 

 local people at any height they care to make it. 

 The claim is usually that they, too, pay this rate. 

 The fact is that they do not;. in fact, they often 

 make their living in these backwoods districts 

 largely by taxing the non-resident. Be this as 

 it may, the states today permit the local people 

 to make forestry and other industries impossible 

 by a form of taxation which is practically con- 

 fiscation. 



(c) That unfairness against the non-residents, 

 and personal badness generally, are fostered in 

 this way, experience amply proves. 



5. The attitude of state and local authority 

 has driven owners to abandon lands. These 

 properties are left unprotected, and the local 

 people generally learn to treat them as commons 

 in which they have a right ; also to hold them 

 in contempt. This feeling has gradually extended 

 to all forest property. This leads to two very 

 serious obstacles to forestry. 



(a) The local people assume the right to dic- 

 tate to the state what it may, and may not do 

 with these lands, and this dictation is accepted 

 in the United States Congress and in every legis- 

 lature of the country. 



(b) The contempt for these properties has per- 

 verted the moral attitude of the local people, and 

 the man who is law-abiding and respects your 

 property under other conditions, does not hesi- 

 tate to set fire to state and other lands ; to 

 take timber from these lands or do other thor- 

 oughly unlawful things. 



6. The remaining forests, the very property 



we should now treasure and husband, is most 

 affected by these two last-named conditions, which 

 are unreasonable taxation and lack of protection. 

 We are planting with one hand on one acre, and 

 are destroying forests already planted by nature 

 with a thousand hands on millions of acres. 



What Can and Should Be Done. 



We are today in a turly serious condition with 

 regard to forests and timber supply. The small 

 beginning for checking the mischief and better- 

 ing conditions is as nothing when compared to 

 our forest devastation. 



Action needed at once NATIONAL: 



1. Purchase and reserve all larger areas of 

 land in danger of permanent devastation.' Here 

 come the large mountain districts one and all ; 

 also large sandy and swampy districts. Restore 

 right of President to create reserves of any and 

 all national lands. 



2. Abolish our present land laws, and handle 

 the remaining public lands according to business 

 principles and for the good of the people. 



3. Enact law enabling the United States and 

 the individual states to exchange lands, and also 

 enabling the United States to buy lands for forest 

 purposes, anywhere, so that scattered areas may 

 be consolidated for better administration. 



4. Abolish import duty on all wood. 



5. Help shippers of timber in their relations 

 with railways, so that a freer exchange of timber 

 is possible or feasible. 



Action needed at once STATE: 



1. Creation and operation of state forests, as 

 far as possible. 



2. Protection of forests by special law and by 

 efficient forest patrol. 



3. Encouraging forestry by (a) honest and 

 reasonable taxation; (b) temporary exemption of 

 all new plantations; (c) education and state aid 

 (advice, plant material, etc.), and (d) payment 

 by state of a reasonable local tax on its owti 

 forests. 



4. Enforced right treatment of all forest prop- 

 erty; forbid indiscriminate clearing and all forest 

 devastation, in keeping with the fundamental con- 

 ception of the right of the commonwealth in all 

 private property. 



YOUNG TREES BURN. 



Fire and Assistant State Fish and Game 

 Warden A. B. BeDell, of Menominee, who lias 

 returned from a trip through Ingallston and 

 Mellen townships, where he inspected the re- 

 gion which was recently swept by a forest 

 fire. The damage amounts to considerable 

 more than first believed, is the report of the 

 forestry warden. 



Mr. BeDell says that ties, posts, poles, 

 shingles and lumber valued at several hundred 

 dollars were consumed and that young trees 

 valued at many times that amount, were ruined 

 by the blaze which raged in a district one mile 

 square in both townships. 



"The fire was started by a Mellen township 

 farmer when a high wind was blowing and 

 while his brush was being consumed the flames 

 began to creep throughout his farm so fast, 

 that it was soon beyond control," says Mr. 

 BeDell. "Several clumps of forests were prac- 

 tically wiped out and several farmers lost their 

 freshly cut ties and poles. Trenches had to be 

 dug and the combined assistance of fifty farm- 

 ers secured before the flames were finally 

 placed under control. No other fires of con- 

 sequence have taken place in Menominee 

 county this spring." 



MICHIGAN'S FOREST RESERVE. 



"Michigan's lower peninsula forest reserve, ac- 

 cording to the results of the conference held 

 at Washington, D. C., between the state and fed- 

 eral officials, will amount to 210,000 acres," says 

 President Snyder, of the M. A. C. He would 

 like to raise the amount to 700,000 acres, and 

 hopes the next legislature may do it. 



"There are 40,000 acres of agricultural college 

 lands," says Prof. Snyder. "At first it was 

 planned to add to add 40,000 acres to these. 



