A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 817 



ization for the quality of performance of his unit, or for means of 

 directing policies and tying them in with the general program and 

 purposes of the State government as a whole. To meet the latter 

 need, the device of directive boards or permanent commissions 

 intended to function essentially as do the boards of directors of corpo- 

 rations has been widely used. 



There are some obvious drawbacks to this form of organization. 

 On the other hand, it has some outstanding merits, and in the main 

 appears to meet most closely the needs of State forestry work. This 

 is most true before the department has attained the stability and 

 prestige that come with time and widespread popular endorsement 

 of its activities. 



Sound principles of administration may seem to be violated by a 

 plan which diminishes the control of the Governor of the State, as 

 its supreme executive, over all its departments. The multiplication 

 of semi-independent departments through the setting up of one 

 commission after another has undoubtedly tended to make State 

 governments unduly complex, cumbersome, decentralized, and 

 expensive. For one thing, this increases the difficulty of firm fiscal 

 control. On the other hand, oversight of the work of the State 

 forester by a nonpolitical board with staggered terms of several years 

 not only safeguards the work very substantially against being political- 

 ized but also pretty well guarantees stability of policies. With an 

 interested and capable board, it affords wise guidance of the depart- 

 ment, support of and assistance to the State forester in accordance 

 with his merits and the need of assistance from his directors to accom- 

 plish his purposes, and a suitable body for sizing up his efficiency and, 

 in case of need, replacing him by a stronger man. But to obtain 

 these results the board must be in fact nonpolitical as well as capable ; 

 must command enough public confidence in both respects so that 

 neither its motives nor the soundness of its judgment will be open to 

 reaonable suspicion; and must be sufficiently interested in the work 

 to be always in full touch with it. Such results are not assured merely 

 by setting up the board or commission form of organization. 



It goes without saying that, whatever the method provided for 

 selecting the State forester, merit only should govern both his appoint- 

 ment and his retention in office. In public business, as in private, 

 nothing else plays so large a part in determining success as the quali- 

 fications for his job of the man in charge. Two dangers to be partic- 

 ularly guarded against in public administration are, on the one 

 hand, that mediocre men will be put in and, having once got in, will 

 become permanent fixtures, and, on the other hand, that good men 

 will not be given the support and the freedom from political inter- 

 ference necessary for large accomplishment. With conspicuously 

 competent State foresters in every State, properly backed up by 

 public opinion and given a fair chance by the State, the forest situa- 

 tion of the country would take on a different aspect. 



The subordinate year-long personnel of the departments should be 

 subject to the same conditions of appointment and retention on a 

 merit basis solely as the State forester himself; their choice should 

 be in his hands. The field force of part-time men, ordinarily called 

 fire wardens and patrolmen, should be subject to supervision by the 

 State forester, should also be chosen and retained on the basis of 

 merit only, and preferably should be appointed by the State forester 



