1382 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



also to dispose of it and to change it as he pleases. The 

 prohibition of denudation applies to but one class of 

 landed property, the forest. An agricultural proprietor 

 can transform his property, make a meadow of a culti- 

 vated field, a pasture of a vineyard ; but such changes 

 are forbidden to the forest owner. He must preserve his 

 property in a forested condition even when he might 

 profit by a change. This lucrative operation is forbid- 

 den him in the public interest. He might, indeed, be 

 indemnified for the heavy burden which is imposed upon 

 him. But he can seek no compensation, no remittance of 

 taxes, no special favor. 



"How shall we justify an intervention of the state so 

 exceptional, a limitation so extraordinary upon the rights 

 of every private owner? It can be explained only by 

 the special nature of forested property. It is this char- 

 acter peculiar to itself which has prompted the enforce- 

 ment of a forestry regime upon public owners like the 



of administering Forests owned by the state, the com- 

 munes, and by public institutions, based upon continuous 

 production and the cutting of no more than the current 

 growth. It contains its own, distinctive, and complete 

 penal system for the protection of these properties. Its 

 penal code is almost taken bodily from that existing 

 under the "ancien regime" and differs profoundly from 

 the modern penal laws of France. Its basis is the fine, 

 imposed in accordance with fixed and arbitrary sched- 

 ules, which are obligatory upon the courts and leave 

 the judge no discretion to consider mitigating circum- 

 stances. These penalties are set forth in minute detail, 

 even to the imposition of heavier fines, in cases where 

 trees are cut at night or with a saw because such tres- 

 passes are more difficult to detect. The- forest officers 

 themselves exercise many judicial functions in the pun- 

 ishment of trespasses. They may even enter that strong- 

 hold of French individual liberty, the home, without 



MULE TEAM BRINGING MARITIME PINE LOGS TO A MILL IN SOUTHWESTERN FRANCE 



communes. The forest once destroyed is so slow to 

 reestablish itself that future generations must be guar- 

 anteed against abuses by the present generation. If the 

 country needs wheat, nothing is easier than to increase 

 the culture of cereals from one year to another; but if 

 the need be for wood, the creation of new forests will 

 require long years during which the public interests will 

 suffer gravely." 



The most striking examples of this solicitude for the 

 preservation of their forests are found in the French 

 code for the administration of publicly owned forests 

 and the laws restricting the denudation of woodlands 

 in private ownership. In each appear significant excep- 

 tions to the general principles which the individualistic 

 and liberty-loving French have incorporated in their 

 legislation since the revolutionary period. The "code 

 forestier" not only defines in precise terms the methods 



warrant, in search of evidence that offenses have been 

 committed. 



The laws concerning private forests impose no pre- 

 scribed methods of cutting other than the obligation 

 resting upon every owner not to destroy his forest with- 

 out prior warrant from the state. Such warrants may 

 be issued by the Minister of Agriculture upon a favorable 

 report from the Conservateur of Waters and Forests, 

 but may be refused on the ground that the proposed 

 denudation would be injurious to the protection of moun- 

 tain soils from erosion, to the protection of inland areas 

 from shifting sand, to the sources of streams, or to the 

 public health. It is to be noted that the right to destroy 

 a forest can not be withheld on the grounds of the needs 

 of the country for timber, although many attempts have 

 been made to incorporate such a provision in the law. 

 The teeth of the legislation concerning the denudation of 



