ment by private owners, and the value of which is rapidly 

 rising because of reduction in the supply and the increase in 

 population. The public service involved in the mere specula- 

 tive holding of this timber for an advance in price, under 

 present conditions of settlement of the country, is practically 

 negligible. When, moreover, such lands become concentrated 

 in a comparatively few hands, there is, instead of a public 

 service, a serious public danger. 



Sale Should Insure to Public Treasury Full Stumpage Value 

 at Time Timber is Cut. 



"Without entering into a discussion of possible solution of 

 certain grave problems involved in the present concentration 

 of timber ownership, it may be pointed out that the govern- 

 ment today still owns, exclusive of the forests of Alaska, about 

 one-fifth of the country's total supply of merchantable stand- 

 ing timber. It is the agency best adapted to practicing re- 

 forestation on a large scale. Recently important suits for 

 forfeiture of extensive timberlands have been brought by the 

 government on the ground of non-fulfillment of conditions im- 

 posed in the grants by which these lands were alienated from 

 the public domain. For these reasons, it would appear, there- 

 fore, that the government may later be able to materially 

 strengthen its relative position as a timber owner. 



"The facts set forth in this report clearly point to the de- 

 sirability of maintaining the integrity of the national forests 

 and of extending to other publicly owned timber, including 

 forests in Alaska and timberlands that may be recovered in 

 forfeiture suits now pending or subsequently instituted by 

 the government, the cardinal principle of the national forest 

 policy, namely, the retention of the fee to such lands at least 

 until the timber is removed. Decision will then have to be 

 made between retaining such lands for reforestation and dis- 

 posing of the surface for agricultural purposes. It seems 

 clear, moreover, that the fundamental principle to be followed 

 in the sale of the timber itself is that the terms of sale should 

 be such as to insure to the public treasury substantially the 

 full stumpage value at the time that such timber shall be 

 actually cut." 



26 



