NATIONAL CONSERVATION CONGRESS 



58, 



vigorous plea for united action by the 

 countries of America for which he be- 

 lieved the time to be ripe. 



Dr. W J McGee, expert in charge of 

 soil erosion investigations, United States 

 Department of Agriculture, spoke on 

 the continent as a home for our people, 

 a subject which his ethnological and 

 soil investigations have especially fitted 

 him to discuss. 



Dr. F. F. Westbrook, of Minneapolis, 

 dean of the Medical College of the Uni- 

 versity of Minnesota, spoke on the sub- 

 ject of life and health as national assets. 

 He earnestly advocated the establish- 

 ment of a national department of health. 



Considerable life was injected into the 

 session by the address of Judge Frank 

 H. Short, of Fresno, California,, on the 

 conservation of capital. Judge Short 

 is an able lawyer and a witty and effec- 

 tive speaker. He frankly confessed 

 being the attorney of a number of large 

 water companies and electric power 

 companies and other corporations, and 

 he made a vigorous defence of capital 

 and threw out a warning to those who 

 are endangering its stability by wild de- 

 nunciations of wealth. He doubted the 

 ability of the United States government 

 as a controller of monopolies and in- 

 sisted that the states could do this better, 

 and that the people of the states could 

 not be deprived of their constitutional 

 right of local self-government. 



United States Commissioner of Ed- 

 ucation Elmer E. Brown spoke in the 

 afternoon on education and conserva- 

 tion. He referred to the new move- 

 ment that has taken place in our edu- 

 cation, turning it more toward industry 



and industrial life. "This new move 

 ment," Mr. Brown said, "is making 

 new demand for men in the business o 

 teaching, strong men technically trair 

 ed for their work. We have no m 

 tional system of education," he mair 

 tained, "and do not want it, but w 

 have and are bound to have a nation; 

 program of education. The feden 

 bureau should survey the whole field c 

 American education and make the be; 

 things contagious throughout th? 

 field/' 



Wallace D. Simmons, of St. Louis, di; 

 cussed conservation from the point c 

 view of the business man. He su 

 gested that expert business men an 

 advertisers should be called in to foi 

 mulate a scheme of reaching the publi 

 generally with the kind of informatio 

 they want and should have alxnit cor 

 servation, and suggested some applies 

 tions of this idea. Alfred L. Baker, o 

 Chicago, was another speaker who cor 

 sidered the general subject from th 

 point of view of the business man. H 

 declared that the great body of busine= 

 men favor the well known policies o 

 conservation. They believe in the go\ 

 eminent control of water power and i 

 the application of scientific forestry t 

 eliminate waste, also in the fire patrc 

 which will prevent the destruction o 

 our forests and of human life. 



James S. Whipple, Forest, Fish an 

 Game Commissioner of New Yorl 

 made a statement in regard. to the cor 

 servation work in that state which al 

 tracted much attention because of it 

 practical value. 



GIFFORD PINCHOT STATES THE CONSERVATION PROGRAM 



There was, of course, especial inter- 

 est in the address of Gifford Pinchot on 

 "The Conservation Program." Noting 

 the progress of the conservation move- 

 ment Mr. Pinchot said that within the 

 last two years it has passed out of the 

 realm of an unimpeachable general 

 principle into that of a practical fight- 

 ing attempt to get things done. The 

 people believe in it and under such cir- 



cumstances the regular method of al 

 tack has always been to approve th 

 principle in its general terms and the 

 condemn . its methods, and men. Th 

 soft pedal conservationist asks for saf 

 and sane legislation, which means, th 

 speaker said, conservation so carefull 

 sterilized that it will do the special ir 

 terests no harm and the people n 

 good. The fundamental principles o 



