642 



CONSERVATION 



The bare announcement that it had been 

 set for December 8 resulted in a number of 

 acceptances before the formal invitation of 

 the Commission had even got into the mail.-. 

 When the conservation movement was 

 started, specific information about the actual 

 state of our resources was partly wanting, 

 partly inaccessible. Certain facts were 

 broadly known. It was at least- unquestiona- 

 ble that our resources had been \\astefully 

 used, and that some of them, notably the 

 mines, were sure in time to he completely 

 exhausted, while others for example, the 

 forests could still be kept perpetually useful 

 by right management. The first work was 

 to get the facts, to show exactly what thr 

 situation was and how it could be improved 

 by measures that would work. Without an 

 inventory of the resources which should show 

 the present condition of resources and the 

 way to develop them to the best advantage, 

 conservation wa- in danger of staying up in 

 the air. 



Plans for the second assembly of the 

 ( iovernors, together with the Govern- 

 ors' advisors and the other representa- 

 tives making up the whole body, are 

 practically completed. The sessions 

 start with a ma-s meeting at the 

 I'.elasco Theater at which President- 

 elect Taft presides. The National 

 Rivers and Harbors Congress and the 

 Southern Commercial Congress, hold- 

 ing their sessions in Washington at the 

 sime time, take prominent parts in the 

 program. The meetings during the 

 week of December I are to be held in 

 the Senate Reading Room of the Li- 

 brary of Congres>, \vhile the place of 

 holding those of the Joint Conservation 

 Conference had nut, at the time this was 

 written, been decided upon. These lat- 



ter sessions will be at 10 a. m. ami 2.1,0 

 p. m. daily, and it is believed the con- 

 ference will continue at least three days. 



The sessions of the National Conser- 

 vation Commission, it is announced, will 

 not be open to the general public. The 

 work to be done at these meetings is 

 that of receiving reports from the four 

 divisions of the Commission, and, while 

 it is realized that the discussion of 

 these reports will be exceedingly full 

 of interest, it is also realized that little 

 could be accomplished in the way of 

 putting these reports into shape for con- 

 sideration at the later meeting, were the 

 public made free of the sessions. 



While, of course, not even the sem- 

 blance of a forecast of the Commis- 

 sion's final report, or any outline of the 

 inventory taken during the past sum- 

 mer, is or can be available until the 

 conclusion of the meetings, it is safe 

 to state that never in the history of the 

 country has so valuable a contribution 

 been made to science and to the general 

 information of the country as is con- 

 tained in the documents that will be 

 submitted to the Joint Conservation 

 Conference. The January number of 

 CONSERVATION will contain the report- 

 in full of the meetings of the Commis- 

 sion, and the later meetings of the Con- 

 ference, and this number will, therefore, 

 be of especial interest and value to all 

 members of The American Forestry As- 

 sociation, as well as the members of 

 other conservation organizations and 

 friends of conservation in general. 



