302 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



Editors of Country Denounce Plan to 



I'itlsbury I'osI : The American Forestry 

 Association, ever a leader in movements 

 having for their end the protection and 

 restoration of our timber resources, is at 

 the head of the present fight. Having 

 members in every state, it is an organiza- 

 tion of no little influence, and the public 

 may rest assured that, against opposition 

 from so powerful a society, the advocates 

 of the obnoxious change in the Forest 

 Service wiH have no easy time. 



Louisville Courier-Journal: Much good 

 will be done by the publicity batteries of 

 the American Forestry Association, turned 

 mercilessly upon the bills under which the 

 Forest Service would be taken out of the 

 Department of ."Xgriculture and put in the 

 Department of the Interior, and under 

 which the resources of -Alaska would be 

 made available to exploiters. The more 

 that is said about the attempted raid upon 

 forestry and upon forests, through Con- 

 gress, the less the probability of its suc- 

 cess. The .American Forestry .Association 

 says a good deal. 



Cleveland Plain Dealer : Secretary Fall, 

 prickling with resentment because of the 

 earnest efforts of .'American conservation- 

 ists to prevent the transfer of forestry con- 

 trol from the Department of Agriculture 

 to the Interior Department, complains that 

 he is the target of propagandists. The Sec- 

 retary is absolutely correct. There is a 

 nation-wide propaganda against the trans- 

 fer. It is significant that practically all 

 the propaganda is in opposition to the 

 change. Those who advocate the transfer 

 have refrained from trying to convince the 

 public. Their incentives are political, and 

 they have hoped that political arguments 

 would be sufficient to persuade Congress. 

 It is not unlikely that they would have been 

 sufficient had it not been for the propa- 

 ganda which has been disseminated by the 

 American Forestry .Association. There is 

 good reason to hope that aroused and en- 

 lightened public sentiment will prevent the 

 backward step which has been contem- 

 plated. Without the propaganda this sen- 

 timent could not have been created. The 

 campaign to save the forests is an instance 

 of propaganda at its best. 



San Francisco Bulletin : Reports from 

 Washington indicate that Secretary .Al- 

 bert A. Fall desires to reabsorb into the 

 Department of the Interior the United 

 States Forest Service which was rescued 

 from it by the Department of Agriculture 

 in 1905. It is now proposed to disrupt that 

 service from the proved and sympathetic 

 association with the Department of .Agri- 



culture under which its remarkable prog- 

 ress was achieved, and to revert its con- 

 trol to the department under which its ef- 

 ficiency became so apparent that even that 

 department itself was glad to relinquish it 

 without a struggle. Therefore, any meas- 

 ure whereby the Forestry Service might be 

 dissociated from the Department of -Agri- 

 culture and reestablished under another de- 

 partment that has already demonstrated its 

 inability to control it, would be an alarming 

 step in any process of departmental reor- 

 ganization that may be attempted. 



.llbuquciquc Journal: Fall demands that 

 the Forestry Service be taken from the De- 

 partment of .Agriculture and turned over 

 to him. The demand is unreasonable and 

 can have no good motive behind it. Con- 

 servation and reforestation are agricul- 

 tural processes. The administrative func- 

 tions are professional. There is no justi- 

 fication for the proposed change. 



Southern Agriculturist : Farmers are 

 just beginning to realize what forest con- 

 servation means to them, and no other de- 

 partment of government is so well fitted to 

 handle forestry work, or can so fit it into 

 the national life, as can the Department of 

 -Agriculture. Farmers should let their 

 congressmen and senators know in no un- 

 certain terms that they do not wish the 

 Department of -Agriculture dismembered. 



A't'w York Mail: The move now made 

 to transfer the Forest Service back to 

 the Department of the Interior "the real 

 estate branch of the government" is sim- 

 ply a counter-attack by those who would 

 exploit the public domain for their own 

 pockets. It must be defeated. 



Lincoln (\'cb.) Journal: Incidentally, the 

 .American Forestry .Association has taken 

 active steps against the change. If forestry 

 isn't agriculture, it is asked, what is it? 

 Perhaps a more potent reason for the op- 

 position is the fact that Secretary Wal- 

 lace is a whole hearted conservationist 

 while Secretary of the Interior Fall is. 

 well, from Xew Mexico. 



Dcs Moines Register: The cold facts 

 about the Alaska matter ought to be known. 

 The Government has now at great cost 

 built a railroad there and opened up the 

 field. Everything is now ready for the 

 interests Secretary Fall has always been 

 identified with to step in and take over 

 the timber and mineral wealth of Alaska, 

 under the usual plea of "developing" our 

 resources. With the Register it is not 



nearly so niucli a question of the proper 

 distribution of authority between the De- 

 partments of -Agriculture and of the In- 

 terior as it is of letting a man like Secre- 

 tary Fall have anything to do with the dis- 

 position of the great resources that may 

 yet be conserved for the benefit of the 

 whole people. Secretary Fall belongs to 

 the frontier, and his standards are the 

 standards of the frontier. "Let him take 

 who has the strength and let him hold who 

 can." He should never have been put in 

 the Cabinet in the first place, and his pow- 

 er should now most certainly not be in- 

 creased. 



Ncivark (.V. J.) News: Altogether, Mr. 

 Fall's argument does not get him anywhere, 

 unless it is in the position of criticism of 

 "a co-ordinate department of the govern- 

 ment," which he attributes to and con- 

 demns in others. He certainly contributes 

 nothing constructive to the main question 

 how best to conserve the disappearing 

 forests, vital to the wdfare of this and 

 future generations dwelling on our lands, 

 public or private. 



Boise Capital News: The West will be 

 called upon to make a stand for or against 

 the Forest Service, if we are to judge the 

 movements under way to attack it. Fores- 

 try is doing admirably where it is. There 

 is not one sound reason of any kind for 

 the proposed transfer. It is neither good 

 administration, good business nor good 

 politics to undo Roosevelt's work. 



Savannah Press: The Service has little 

 business with the Department of the In- 

 terior. There are stalking horses behind 

 the grab. 



Grand Rapids (Mich.) AUws: Secretary 

 Fall's proposal has met with what appar- 

 ently is almost unanimous opposition on the 

 part of those who heretofore have con- 

 cerned themselves most with forest conser- 

 vation, from the farm bureaus and from 

 the majority of the agricultural interests. 

 The Michigan state farm bureau is among 

 those organizations protesting against the 

 Fall proposal. The American Forestry 

 .Association, the premier organization for 

 forest conservation, has entered a strong 

 protest. 



Idaho Daily Statesman : The quarrel over 

 the proposed transfer of the Forest Serv-^ 

 ice to the Department of the Interior from 

 the Department of Agriculture will end 

 when we are able to decide whether a for- 

 est is a crop or merely real estate. If we 



