STORY OF OUR NATIONAL FOREST 117 



almost uniformly been allowed to overbalance public 

 rights. The change we made was right, and was 

 vitally necessary; but, of course, it created bitter 

 opposition from private interests. 



"One of the principles whose application was 

 the source of much hostility was this: It is better 

 for the Government to help a poor man to make a 

 living for his family than to help a rich man make 

 more profit for his company. This principle was 

 too sound to be fought openly. It is the kind of 

 principle to which politicians delight to pay unctuous 

 homage in words. But we translated the words into 

 deeds ; and when they found that this was the case, 

 many rich men, especially sheep owners, were stirred 

 to hostility, and they used the Congressmen they 

 controlled to assault us getting most aid from cer- 

 tain demagogues, who were equally glad improperly 

 to denounce rich men in public and improperly to 

 serve them in private. The Forest Service estab- 

 lished and enforced regulations which favored the 

 settler as against the large stock owner; required 

 that necessary reductions in the stock grazed on any 

 National Forest should bear first on the big man, 

 before the few head of the small man, upon which 

 the living of his family depended, were reduced ; and 

 made grazing in the National Forests a help instead 

 of a hindrance to permanent settlement. As a re- 

 sult, the small settlers and their families became, on 

 the whole, the best friends the Forest Service has; 

 although in places their ignorance was played on by 



