lobi CONSERVATION 



National Government are inadequate to Two Striking Comments 



checkmate them; the help of every Qw wg jnt two editona , Sr 



public-spirited citizen is needed if we ^ from ^^ .^^ ^ ^ 



are to keep what we have metropolitan daily newspapers. The 



editorials are printed just as they ap- 



% % % peared, with their original headings; 



they show with what unanimity the 



Eternal Vigilance really strong newspapers agree on the 



subject of natural resource conserva- 



CORPORATIONS do not die; t ion. The first is from the Washington 



neither do they neglect any oppor- Post, the second from the Washington 



tunities. The resources of the Govern- Herald. 

 ment, kept by designing politicians to 



the lowest possible figure, are often in- ^ ^ ^ 

 sufficient to uncover and to secure A Nation's Prodigal Waste 

 proofs of corporate villainies. There- 

 fore it behooves all who love their , p THE National Conservation Coin- 

 country, and who have a real interest mission were to dissolve to-day, 

 in that country's future, to be equally without doing- anything more, it 

 vigilant. "Eternal vigilance is the price would still deserve the gratitude of 

 of liberty ;" and eternal vigilance is the every thinking man in the United States 

 price of freedom from corporation for drawing up the indictment of the 

 ownership of our sole remaining natu- whole people for the crime of waste, 

 ral resource that is of real and abiding The report forwarded to Congress by 



. , , the President is commanding in its 



value. We must work for reforesta- wami to the country . The figures 



tion wherever it is needed and where presented are of astounding propor- 



does the need not exist? we must tions Evidently, the United States is 



work for the conservation, by rational a Colossus in profligate waste, as it is 



development and exploitation, of our i n other respects. But there is an end 



forests and our mines ; we must prevent to every excess, and no fortune is so 



the terrible waste and loss of produc- great that a spendthrift cannot squan- 



tiveness of our farming lands, due to der it. 



soil erosion; but we must also, with With a useless waste of $1,000,000 



sleepless and never-ceasing vigilance, day in mineral products, $1,0^000, 



, r . , day in preventable fires, $2,000,000 a 



uard from the hand of the pillager .the ' ^ h the f & of insects> $I r 



waterways and the water-powers of the > ^ ^ {n ^ erosion> and Qther 

 country. The day will come when our waste and losses running i nto mil- 

 coal will be gone, when the mines will lions a day through plant disease, forest 

 be emptied and when fuel for power- fireS) floods> an i ma l depredations, soil 

 production and for the generation of deterioration, etc., etc., it is possible to 

 heat and light will be practically at an understand why the United States, the 

 end. On that day the people of this richest land under the sun, with the 

 country will turn to the water-powers most enterprising and energetic peo- 

 for salvation. If we, the people of to- pi e> fi nds itself facing the exhaustion 

 day, do not take steps, do not do all of many of its resources while still in 

 within the power of mortals, to safer its youth. It is living upon its capital, 

 guard those water-powers we and our "Neither the increase in acreage nor the 

 children and our children's children yield per acre has kept pace with our 

 will suffer for our criminal neglect and increase in population," says the Com- 

 blind fatuity. mission. This statement, taken in con- 



