VOL. XIV 



MARCH, 1908 



No. 3 



EDITORIAL 



The As might have been ex- 



Constitutional pected to occur in due 

 Question . . , . 



course, the Appalachian- 

 White Mountain Bill is. at this writ- 

 ing, facing the legal sphinx. The 

 question is, Is such legislation consti- 

 tutional? 



At the Annual Meeting this ques- 

 tion was argued by Mr. Harvey X. 

 Shepard and also by Congressman 

 Lever. On the following day, at the 

 hearing before the Committee on 

 Vgriculture of the House of Repre- 

 -t-ntatives, Mr. Shepard again and, 

 also, Hon. Hoke Smith. Governor of 

 Georgia, spoke to the- same question. 

 Since then, the House has referred 

 the bill to its Committee on Judiciary, 

 before which a hearing has been an- 

 nounced for Thursday, February 

 27th. 



I >r. Samuel Johnson once declared 

 that "' 'Patriotism' is the last refuse of 

 a scoundrel." Likewise, since the be- 

 ginning of our constitutional era, con- 

 stitutionalism, though -ometimes in 

 order, has u-uallv pr >ved the last re- 

 fuge of the obstructionist. In hi- 

 Constitutional Hi-torv "f the I'nitcd 

 States Dr. Yon I !o!-t In- commented 

 pointedly en thi hen ,"11 o'her 



arguments against a genuinely good 

 thing have failed, its opponents seek 

 to prove it "unconstitutional." 



Consider the situation. As i> well 

 known to the readers of this publi. 

 tion, it includes such facts a> the fol- 

 lowing: Our forests are going at a 

 rate which will consume them in about 

 a third of a century; the beginnings 

 of a timber famine are already with 

 us. The reclamation of our \Ve-tern 

 deserts depends upon the e\i-tence <>\ 

 forests in the mountains adjacent to 

 the deserts. Largely thr >uiji defor< 

 tation. one billion dollars worth or 

 more of fertile soil is annually being 

 swept into our ri ;iid barb..- 



thus, at one and the same time, impov- 

 erishing our fields, impairing our 

 commerce, and 



troitS 'he Xalion 



nually some hundred million d 

 Our inland wa 1 itesl i 



ural resource, arc largely running to 

 waste, an amourt I an in- 



vestment of more than om 

 lars running idb. "incut 



dam-. I' thi -r\-atiou . -t" tl 



waters, f utial. The 



question, agai- draining "iir 



swam;-- i ly coir with th.v 



