THE WOOD CROP 219 



demand will undoubtedly increase, it is a fair question, 

 then, whether the vast demands of the future upon our 

 forests are likely to be met. You are mighty poor Ameri- 

 cans if your care for the well-being of this country is limited 

 to hoping that that well-being will last out your own genera- 

 tion. No man here or elsewhere is entitled to call himself 

 a decent citizen if he does not try to do his part toward 

 seeing that our national policies are shaped for the advan- 

 tage of our children and our children's children. Our 

 country, we have faith to believe, is only at the beginning 

 of its growth. Unless the forests of the United States can 

 be made ready to meet the vast demands which this 

 growth will inevitably bring, commercial disaster, that 

 means disaster to the whole country, is inevitable. If 

 the present rate of forest destruction is allowed to con- 

 tinue, with nothing to offset it, a timber famine in the 

 future is inevitable. Fire, wasteful and destructive forms 

 of lumbering, and the legitimate use, taken together, are 

 destroying our forest resources far more rapidly than they 

 are being replaced. It is difficult to imagine what such a 

 timber famine would mean to our resources. And the 

 period of recovery from the injuries which a timber famine 

 would entail would be measured by the slow growth of 

 the trees themselves. Remember that you can prevent 

 such a timber famine occurring, by wise action taken in 

 time; but, once the famine occurs, there is no possible 

 way of hurrying the growth of the trees necessary to re- 

 lieve it." 1 



207. National Forests. On June 30, 1908, the United 

 States government owned 165 national forests with an 



1 Theodore Roosevelt, President of the United States, before the Amer- 

 ican Forest Congress. Circular No. 35 Bureau of Forestry, pp. 6, 7. 



