EDITORIAL 297 



Far-away Forestry public at reasonable rates, government 



operation of coal mines, national own- 



| N OUR news columns will be found ershi of railroads and telegraphs, mu- 



a paragraph on forestry in Hawaii. nidpal ownership of water , gas, elec- 



Other matter at hand indicates the deep tric> and street car plantSi equal suf . 



interest of the women of that country fra (Hrect nominat i ons> hearing and 



m forestry and conservation questioning of candidates, voting by 



Far to the southwest of Hawaii m maih and> in genera]) the inauguration 



the latitude of South Africa, is New of a political system which makes the 



Zealand, a country which, in some n-- boss and mac hi ne impossible, and gov- 



spects, is to-day the most remarkable e rnment by the people not "an iricles- 



in the world. cent dream," but a fact. 



A century and a half ago its inhabi- In view of t h e advanced ground 

 tants were living in the Stone Age. ta k en by New Zealand on such ques- 

 Among them to-day are some who t i ons as are above indicated, we are pre- 

 vividly remember the taste of human pared for the statement that that conn- 

 flesh and who, like the Israelites in try maintains a progressive state forest 

 the desert, yearning for the fleshpots, policy. Says Prof. Frank Parsons 

 leeks, and garlic of Egypt, still hanker i^ his book, "The Story of New 

 after "long-pig," as this particular Zealand" (p. 143) : 

 species of meat is jocosely called by "The splendid forests of New Zealand 

 them. had for years been subject to a rapid 



New Zealand was discovered by Tas- process of destruction by forest fires 

 man in 1642, explored by Captain Cook an s commercial vandalism. It became 

 in 1769, first visited by English mission- evident that the supply of timber would 

 aries in 1814, annexed to the British no t last many decades if something 

 Empire in 1840, partially pacified in we re not done to check the wastes and 

 1848, and, finally, in 1870; it was given losses. Moreover, the rainfall and 

 its first constitution in 1852 ; it held its river sources of wide districts were be- 

 first parliamentary session in 1854 ; ing seriously affected ; and in many 

 opened its first railway in 1863, and, places on the mountain slopes where 

 about that time, entered upon its won- the soil was thin the removal of the 

 derful career of innovation, progress, trees left it at the mercy of the storms, 

 and prosperity. which washed it away, leaving the 



In 1890, through a combination of rocks entirely bare, undoing in a few 



farmers and workingmen, occurred the months the whole results of nature's 



political overturn whereby the control soil-building carried on through ages 



of the government passed from the of the past. 



conservatives to the progressives. Since "To stop these evils a forest act was 

 that time has come the movement for passed in 1885 to provide for the res- 

 the nationalization of land, including ervation of state forests and the con- 

 state resumption of large estates, the trol and management of them by the 

 progressive taxation of land values, in- government." 



comes and inheritances, the checking of The preamble of the act recites that 

 panics through government control and it is "expedient to make provision for 

 guarantee of bank issues, the national- setting apart areas of forest land in 

 ization of credit, with government loans New Zealand as state forests, and to 

 to farmers, merchants, and working- subject the same to skilled manage- 

 men, the advanced governmental stand ment and proper control in order 

 on the labor question, including the ere- thereby to prevent undue waste of tim- 

 ation of a minister of labor with a seat ber, and to provide timber for future 

 in the cabinet, the establishment of gov- industrial purposes, and to provide for 

 ernment life and accident insurance and the proper conservation of climatic con- 

 old-age pensions, government owner- ditions by the preservation of forest 

 ship of patents, made available to the growth in elevated situations." 



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