for successful agriculture, and still it had been demon- 

 strated that lands of this quality could be economically 

 used in growing timber. He spoke of the fact that 

 here was a great investment that the State of Michigan 

 was simply not looking after; that in it were great pos- 

 sibilities. By simply keeping out the fires, every acre 

 of this land would each year add a dollar to its value 

 in timber growth. He explained that while on so 

 large an area the expense of successfully combating 

 the fires seemed a considerable amount, still, consid- 

 ering the vast results, it was really a very small in- 

 vestment for the State to make. He put great em- 

 phasis upon the practical partnership that the State 

 had with a lot of men who were using these lands for 

 speculative purposes and defrauding people through 

 misrepresentations. In these transactions the State 

 was in fellowship with what seemed to him to be the 

 borderland of crime. The importance of dealing with 

 this problem in a business way could hardly be over- 

 estimated. 



Hon. E. A. Wildey followed, giving 

 Mr. Wildey's the results of his experience as Corn- 

 View missioner of the State Land Office and 

 Secretary of the Forestry Commission, 

 in connection with "these lands. He thought the de- 

 linquent tax lands, as soon as they became the prop- 

 erty of the State under the statute of limitations, 

 should be reviewed carefully, and all that were mer- 

 chantable for agricultural purposes, put on the market 

 in the same kind of a way that an individual land 

 holder would do, securing as prompt and large re- 

 sults for the State as possible. The remainder of the 

 land would far better be permanently in forest than 

 for any other purpose. 



Former Auditor General Perry F. 

 Perry Powers, spoke from his experience, 



Powers' intimating that the volume of land in 



Speech round figures which had been given as 



delinquent tax lands, might be misin- 

 terpreted, for there were only 800,000 acres that actu- 

 ally had' been deeded to the State and were in condi- 

 tion to be treated with upon some comprehensive 

 plan. In answer to inquiries, however, he said that it 

 was true that the volume of lands on the way to the 

 State as a result of delinquent taxes had not been 

 materially lessened in a good many years. 



Method in Mr. John J. Hubbell, in response to 



Taxation a request, reported his plan of taxa- 



tion which had been incidentally men- 

 tioned in one of the earlier meetings. He had some 

 doubts about the modern forestry method as applied 

 to lumbering off the virgin forests. He rather thought 

 from his experience and observation, that it was better 

 to make a clean sweep of the forest, and then handle 

 the lands upon the most advanced forestry methods, 

 by keeping out fire and doing a reasonable amount of 

 sorting, at a minimum expense. A rapid growth 

 would result, which in a man's lifetime would be worth 

 more than the virgin forest, with the appreciation in 

 prices for forest products. He believed that a system 

 of taxation could be evolved which would not hamper 

 local enterprise in the development of the country, 

 and still would induce people to leave considerable 

 areas of land in permanent forest growth. By re- 

 fusing to tax timbered lands at a greater rate per acre 

 than the average farm land in the vicinity, and then 

 at the time of harvesting the timber levying a small 

 specific tax, he felt that the desired result would, be 

 accomplished. This might require a constitutional 

 amendment, but some plan should be worked out at 

 once which would in its development put a premium 

 upon reforestation. 



