CONSERVATION OF WATER BY STORAGE 



819 



fuel, would be employed, is not only 

 the utilization of a freely given resource 

 which would otherwise be wasted, but 

 it involves the saving of a corresponding 

 amount of one of the non-renewable or 

 slowly renewable resources. The use 

 of water power to furnish motive power 

 for street or steam railways, or for 

 lighting, saves an equivalent amount of 

 coal. The conservation of water power, 

 therefore, is a double conservation, and 

 it would seem, therefore, inasmuch as 

 it involves the conservation of a non- 

 renewable resource of a strictly limited 

 supply, that its conservation is of 

 greater importance than that of any 

 other of our material resources." 



This is followed by a masterly dis- 

 cussion and exposition, from an en- 

 gineering standpoint, of water power 

 utilization, with a study of Riparian 

 Rights and of the powers of the Govern- 

 ment over Navigable Streams, and in 

 Chapters III and IV by a study of 

 questions surrounding the problems of 

 Water Power at Government Dams, 

 and of Water Power at Private Dams. 

 The engineering, riparian and other 

 legal questions involved are exhaustively 

 discussed, yet succinctly and without 

 prolixity or unnecessary expansion. 



The author luminously weighs the 

 important questions surrounding govern- 

 mental control and well says : ' ' Indeed 

 the conservation movement in the past, 

 particularly as regards water powers, 

 has been too much dominated by the 

 idea of enforcing the arbitrary powers 

 of the Federal and State Governments, 

 and extending regulation and restriction 

 to their utmost limits." And Dr. 

 Swain here quotes the remark of a well- 

 known Senator who said, "That is the 

 trouble with the present craze for 

 restriction and regulation of private 

 investment in these enterprises. You 

 regulate and restrict to the extent that 

 you have nothing to regulate." 



Dr. Swain further wisely says, "It is 

 from a point of view of pure conserva- 

 tion that the development of water 

 power is most important. When we 

 consider also that the development of 

 water power not only conserves furl, 

 but directly serves to promote the 

 navigability of rivers, we should be 

 very careful how we discourage this 



triple conservation in order to secure 

 other results which we may consider 

 desirable. If we do discourage it, we 

 may be antimonopolists, or something 

 else, but we are certainly not conserva- 

 tionists. The conservation movement, 

 originating in a wise demand for the 

 economical use of our natural (not 

 national) resources, has too much de- 

 teriorated into a demand that those 

 resources be retained by the National 

 Government and not permitted to be 

 developed by private capital except 

 under restrictive burdens." 



What a broad statesmanlike and 

 wise conclusion is given in the following 

 summary of Dr. Swain's admirable 

 discussion in Chapter IV of the ques- 

 tions surrounding the matter of mo- 

 nopoly in Water Power Development: 



"Finally, in considering this entire 

 water power discussion, it is very 

 important to avoid the attitude of 

 mind taken by so many in these days, 

 which assumes that average business 

 morality is less than average public 

 morality. In times of old, it was a 

 popular adage that 'the king can do 

 no wrong,' though perhaps, rather than 

 popular, it was a belief entertained 

 mainly by kings themselves. Today 

 there is a similar popular impression 

 that the Government can do no wrong. 

 Where the people are sovereign, they 

 are very apt to imitate other sovereigns 

 in assuming themselves incapable of 

 error. It was a maxim of Robespierre's, 

 which dictated his entire infamous 

 career, and which led to his brief 

 period of power and his ultimate ruin, 

 that 'The people are never wrong.' 



"Both impressions are equally erro- 

 neous. Government bureaus and officials 

 in a democracy may be guilty of just 

 as flagrant abuses of justice as kings or 

 individuals." 



Chapter V on "Water Power on the 

 Public Domain" is a timely discussion 

 of a great question which occupied 

 much attention in the last National 

 Congress, and which presents facts and 

 engineering conclusions which should 

 be of weight in the final determination 

 of the Government policy. To show 

 the serious economic question presented 

 by the Government's continued owner- 

 ship of lands, in Western States, Dr. 



