458 United States. 



control of the federal government. Each State being 

 under the Constitution sovereign in itself as far as its 

 internal administration is concerned, it is evident that 

 no uniformity of policies can be expected, except so 

 far as imitativeness, in which the American citizen 

 excels, may lead State after State to repeat the ex- 

 periment attempted by one. The federal govern- 

 ment has no direct jurisdiction in matters concerning 

 the management of resources within the States, ex- 

 cept so far as it still owns lands in the Western, so- 

 called Public Land States, and a few parcels in the 

 Eastern States over which it still retains jurisdiction. 

 The severest test of democratic institutions is ex- 

 perienced when the attempt is made to establish a 

 policy which shall guard the interests of the future at 

 the expense of the demands and needs of the present. 

 Democracy produces attitudes and characteristics 

 of the people which are inimical to stable economic 

 arrangements looking to the future, such as are im- 

 plied in a forest policy. The vast country with an 

 unevenly distributed and heterogeneous population 

 presents the greatest variety of natural, as well as of 

 economic conditions; the immediate interests of one 

 section naturally do not coincide with those of other 

 sections; particularistic and individualistic tendencies 

 of the true democrat are antagonistic to anything 

 which smaks of " paternalism, " the attitude 

 under which alone a persistent, farsighted policy can 

 thrive. Frequent change of administration, or at 

 least the threat of such change, impedes consistent 

 execution of plans; fickle public opinion may subvert 

 at any time well laid plans which take time in maturing ; 



