is in sober thought and free from petty prejudices when 

 I say that I hail with delight the great principle before us 

 and that we should adopt the great constructive program 

 set up by Secretary Hoover in the great Washington con- 

 ference of May 22nd. 



It seems to me that it is not allocated to your Tem- 

 porary Chairman the duty and necessity of covering the en- 

 tire field for thought and consideration during the confer- 

 ence, but I believe we should be impressed with these 

 thoughts at the beginning, namely: that we have two prin- 

 ciples that we must not overlook and that both must stand 

 out boldly in all of our considerations. One is that there 

 must be a standardization of name, quality and sizes of all 

 lumber produced in the United States to the fullest extent 

 possible. And the other thought is that this service must be 

 given to the public on the same basis that it is given to the 

 members of the association. I am glad that the Department 

 of Commerce at Washington has taken up this standardiza- 

 tion program and I want to apologize for the fact that our 

 organization in the past has not cooperated with that great 

 branch of the Government as we should have, for we have 

 lately seen the influence that can be exerted through the 

 head of that Department. 



If you will grant me the privilege of reading one or two 

 paragraphs which doubtless many of you have read before 

 I shall be pleased to do so. The first one thus states : 



"The hope of the Department of Commerce in calling 

 this preliminary conference was provision of a system 

 throughout the country for inspection and guaranty of 

 the quality, quantity and grade of lumber with a view 

 to affording all possible protection to the consuming 

 public ; that ways would be found to simplify the dimen- 

 sions of lumber *and secure the right proportion of lum- 

 ber to different types of consumers with a view to 

 eliminate waste, decreasing cost of distribution, and to 

 see that agencies for accomplishing these purposes 

 should be set up by the lumber industry itself. 



"The Secretary of Commerce proposed that a nation- 

 al system of inspection and certification should be cre- 

 ated by the industry to embrace all of the lumber trade ; 



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