618 A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 



PECULIAR ASPECTS OF INDIAN PROBLEM 



In considering the management of Indian forest lands, allowance 

 must be made for certain aspects which are peculiar to the Indian 

 problem. 



Indian lands "are private property, held in sacred trust by the 

 United States for the benefit of the Indians" (5, p. 841). The 

 United States Indian Service was designated by the Congress more 

 than 100 years ago as the Government bureau responsible for the 

 custody and administration of -Indian property, and this property 

 has been and is now handled by the Indian Service in accordance with 

 provisions of laws enacted by the Congress and interpreted by the 

 courts. Under these laws and interpretations the Indians are entitled 

 to enjoy the full benefit to be derived from forests and other natural 

 resources on their lands. Indian forests are owned by Indians and 

 managed primarily for the best benefit of their Indian owners, and 

 Indian forest policies and Indian forestry activities cannot be deter- 

 mined and carried on solely from the standpoint of technically correct 

 forest working or management plans, nor with the forest needs of the 

 entire body politic primarily in view. 



Furthermore, forestry on Indian lands is inevitably tied up with 

 the general Indian problem, a complex puzzle not yet solved and 

 necessitating the consideration of many questions connected with the 

 educational, social, and industrial welfare of this race. The admin- 

 istration of Indian forest-property interests is inseparably inter- 

 twined with other phases of Indian administration (5, p. 842), and it 

 has sometimes been necessary to adopt Indian forest policies widely 

 divergent from theoretically correct forest-management policies be- 

 cause of the needs of the Indian owners. Indian forest policies must 

 be varied and modified to fit social and economic conditions on the 

 several reservations and even on different parts of the same reserva- 

 tion. 



On some reservations the merchantable stand of timber on tribal 

 lands constitutes practically the only source of revenue from which 

 the cost of social and industrial betterments for the tribe can be met 

 by the Indian Service. Hundreds, nay, even thousands, of destitute 

 Indians have been allotted tracts of heavily timbered land. The only 

 means the Indian Service has had through which to keep these un- 

 fortunate people from starvation is to sell their timber and derive 

 therefrom as large a revenue as possible. Other recipients of heavily 

 timbered allotments have needed money for educational purposes, for 

 the building of houses, or for the purchase of farming equipment 

 (6, p. 473). Under such circumstances, insistence upon the practice 

 of a highly intensive forest policy cannot be justified. Such condi- 

 tions demand flexibility not only in formulating general policies but 

 in carrying them out. 



Under the peculiar conditions which surround and govern the ad- 

 ministration of Indian affairs, the permanency of Indian forest poli- 

 cies can be no greater than the permanency of general Indian Service 

 policies which are based on legislation enacted by the Congress, inter- 

 preted by the courts, and carried out under regulations promulgated 

 or approved by the Secretary of the Interior. Under decisions of the 

 Supreme Court of the United States the status of Indian lands may 

 be modified at any time by an act of Congress. Furthermore, there 



