present conference by the National Conservation Commission. I shall 

 not attempt to review these results further than to say that the more 

 striking facts brought out at the conference last May are amply con- 

 firmed. These facts are sobering. No right-minded citizen would stop 

 the proper use of our resources, but every good American must realize 

 that national improvidence follows the same course and leads to the 

 same end as personal improvidence and no man is a good American 

 if he does not think of future Americans, any more than a man is a 

 good citizen if he does not think of his children's welfare; for there 

 isn't any man whom we despise more than the man who has a good 

 time himself and whose children pay for it. So with the nation ; that 

 nation is contemptible that riots in abundance by wasting the heritage 

 it should leave to the citizens that are to come afterwards. Needless 

 waste must stop. The time to deride or neglect the statements of ex- 

 perts and the teaching of the facts has gone by. The time to act on 

 what we already know has arrived. Common prudence, common sense, 

 and common business principles are applicable to national affairs just 

 as they are to private affairs, and the time has come to apply them in 

 dealing with the foundations of our prosperity. 





Rolling surface of country in southwestern Georgia where unhindered erosion is 

 menacing the soil. If the non-agricultural land were in forest it would yield val- 

 uable returns in wood besides being protected from erosion. 



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