AMERICAN FORESTRY 



National Forests as a Business Proposition 



AS IS generally known, twenty-live 

 per cent of the receipts 

 National Forests in each state are re 

 turned annually to that state for ro 

 and schools. For the year ending Jt 

 30, 1908, the amount of these receipt 

 was $1,788,255.19. As a part of 

 annual budget of a 

 state, its share of this sum is a 1 



i tem - 



main," and "urges the fullest possible 

 liberality on the part of the Government 

 . fl ing the lands an d their resources 

 into the hands o f jj 0na fid e citizens." 

 TQ thig school> t i ie idea that the public 

 domain j s " a national heritage to be 

 handed down" to the people, is odious, 

 ^ natkmal administration of a na- 

 tional estate {& constant i y proclaimed as 

 "feudalism," "bureaucracy," the con- 

 version of a free people into a "ten- 

 and the like; and to its mill, 



the National 



= ST t^ s dgrasped and never 



return forgotten ; otherwise, the incessant war- 



that every dol- *rf upon Mr. Pinchot and his work 



lar returned to them was a dollar cannot be understood 



gained, when, in point of fact, they Let the position of the above ed 



paid four dollars to get one ; and, on top tonal be analyzed. The receipts 



of their four dollars the National Gov- the National Forests last year equaled 



ernment was compelled to pay five dol- almost forty-eight per cent of the na- 



lars. So it cost the Federal Treasury tional appropriation for 



and the state industry nine dollars to Service, and of these receipts, the Na- 



get one dollar for local roads and tional Forest states received twenty-five 



schools." P er cent - Thus, "it cost the Federal 



This astounding statement is ex- Treasury and the state industries nine 



plained as follows : "The appropriations dollars to get one dollar for local roads 



by Congress for the Pinchot bureau and schools." 



for the year ending June 30, 1908, The assumption evidently is that be- 



were $3.759,086.46. During the same cause the National Forests in 1908 re- 



period the net receipts from timber turned in cash about half what Congress 



sales, penalties, grazing fees and uses appropriated for the United States 



were $1,788,255.19. Of this latter Forest Service, the American people 



amount, paid by the people of the state, get out of that Service but one dollar 



there was returned to the several states where they put in nine. 



fine-quarter. Thus it cost individual Suppose the Forest Service collected 



citizens $1,341,192.45 more than was more money from the National Forests, 



paid back to their state; and it cost as, for example, by selling more timber, 



the National Treasury of the people's it might easily do, what. then? One of 



money an additional amount of $i,- the constant grounds of attack by these 



v 0.83 1. 27. " It cost the people critics is that the Forest Service charges 



nearly $4,000,000 to collect $1,788,000 for the use of the natural resources in 



from themselves." its charge. Hence the greater the re- 



in closing, the writer refers to ceipts of the Service, the greater the 



"persons who think the people can en- offense committed by ''Baron Pinchot." 



rich themselves by paying a Federal These criticism^ suggest the familiar 



bureau t<> collect nine dollars from the alternative of a decadent theology under 



public in order to have one dollar re- the terms of which you are "d d if you 



turned to schools and roads." 



do, and d d if you don't." 



This editorial is typical of the matter If the Forest Service charges for the 



vhidi. from day to day, is served up use of the natural resources it is reduc- 



|o \\< n riders by the school which lays ing the people to vassalage; if it fails 



d(. \\-n as an article of faith that "it to charge enough to cover its entire 



a crime to perpetuate the public do- congressional appropriation it is wast- 



