A NATIONAL PLAN FOE AMERICAN FORESTRY 687 



plan. By providing for the work at the forest experiment stations 

 full correlation with related classes of forest research and lowest costs 

 are insured. 



Justification for this legislation lies in part in the growing impor- 

 tance of flood control in the United States. Major flood catastrophes 

 are ordinarily taken into account only as detached occurrences and 

 are soon forgotten. Lesser floods are often ignored and never con- 

 sidered in the aggregate. The flood situation of the United States 

 is, therefore, far more serious and the necessity for control far more 

 important than is generally realized. 



Justification lies also in part in erosion losses which threaten to 

 make man-made deserts of an enormous area of land and threaten 

 seriously to reduce the productivity of another enormous area. Much 

 of the process is so insidious and so inconspicuous that little realiza- 

 tion exists nationally or even locally of what is going on and what it 

 means. 



Justification for this legislation lies in part in the fact that water 

 for agricultural, muncipal, power, and other uses is both the key to 

 and the limiting factor in the development of the West. Recognition 

 of the growing need for municipal supplies shows that water is also 

 one of the most important factors in maintaining the development 

 of the East. 



Justification lies also in wide differences of opinion as to whether 

 forest and other cover is a decisive factor in erosion and the regulation 

 of stream flow. These differences range from flat rejection, through 

 theoretical but passive acceptance, to full acceptance handicapped in 

 detailed application to forest and range management by lack of 

 knowledge. These differences are reflected in public demands as 

 divergent as for the total destruction of the forest or chaparral or 

 range cover, or its full protection against fire, cutting, and grazing. 

 They are reflected in radically different policies or the entire lack of 

 policies in the administration of public and private lands with water- 

 shed values. They are reflected in expenditures of hundreds of 

 millions of dollars for flood control, the improvement of navigation, 

 dams, and for municipal water supplies in which the possibilities of 

 such influences are disregarded or variously recognized. In the last 

 analysis these differences in opinion, demands, and action reflect the 

 lack of knowledge which the proposed legislation is designed to supply 

 up to the limit of Federal obligations. The existing watershed 

 conditions in the United States which justify the enactment of this 

 legislation are described in detail in another section of the report on 

 Senate Resolution 175. 



The provision for the Forest Survey in the McSweeney Act is 

 probably the best that could have been obtained in 1928. The 

 limitation of annual expenditures to $250,000 drastically limits the 

 rate of progress and inevitably extends the period required for com- 

 pletion. One unfortunate result will be the obsolescence of data for 

 one region before it can be obtained for others. Furthermore, 

 uncertainties and wide differences of opinion on forest policy con- 

 tinually emphasize the need for information which the Forest Survey 

 is obtaining. In nearly every important forest region of the United 

 States the depression has brought to light serious problems for the 

 lasting solution of which the Survey alone can furnish the necessary 

 information. A modification of the Research Act is therefore justified 



