METHODS OF FOREST POLICY. 265 



Wherever else supervision or interference with 

 the free exercise of property rights exists on the 

 part of the state, it is not based on questions of 

 supply, but of protection to threatened interests 

 of some magnitude. 



In this respect, as we have seen, forest property 

 assumes a peculiar position. 



The recognition of the fact that the removal of 

 the protecting forest cover may give rise to shift- 

 ing sands and sand dunes, which may encroach 

 and despoil larger areas beyond, is sufficient call 

 for the exercise of the police functions of the state 

 to prevent such damage, if we admit the providen- 

 tial character of such functions. 



The experience that the deforestation or even 

 bad management of the forest cover, forest devas- 

 tation, on mountain tops and hills, leads to exces- 

 sive water stages, to destructive floods, filHng 

 channels, thereby impeding navigation and silting 

 agricultural soils, damaging neighboring or dis- 

 tant interests, again makes the exercise of the 

 police function of the state, in the wider sense in 

 which I have defined it, necessary in order to 

 prevent the consequences of mismanagement of 

 the protective forest cover in such particular 

 situations. 



The sugar planter in Louisiana, whose crop is 

 endangered or destroyed by overflows due to 

 causes a thousand miles away, has a right to pro- 

 tection through the government. The city mer- 



