FORESTRY IN THE UNITED STATES 99 



other nations, it was going to be necessary for us to first feel 

 the pinch of timber shortage before we sliould interest our- 

 selves in so academic a subject as forestry. 



As a matter of fact, the immediate need of our new nation, 

 at that time, was to develop its resources, not conserve them. In 

 the early days of the past century our government found it- 

 self with enormous tracts of undeveloped lands on its hands. 

 This great area known as the public domain included practi- 

 cally all land not in private ownership. The immediate prob- 

 lem was to encourage settlement on this land, to bring in indus- 

 tries, railroads, sawmills and ranches. In furthering this policy 

 the government displayed a degree of generosity in giving 

 away land to railroads, industries and settlers that from today's 

 viewpoint amounted to profligacy. Little thought was given to 

 the wastage that might attend so liberal a policy, or what 

 effect it might have on coming generations. The federal gov- 

 ernment, the owner and custodian of these thousands of square 

 miles of public domain, was unable to protect them against 

 theft, and billions of feet of timber in the Lake States and in 

 the West were stolen from these public lands under pretense 

 and fraud. 



Meanwhile a few men, foreseeing the time when we should 

 need all this timber, raised their voices against these wholesale 

 thefts and wasteful methods, but they were unheeded voices 

 calling in the wilderness. It was urged more than once that 

 the federal timber lands should be given to the States for pro- 

 tection and management. There existed more than one valid 

 reason for this change, since the States at least were in a posi- 

 tion to protect and administer the timber within their own 

 boundaries, while the far-off government in Washington 



