STORY OF OUR NATIONAL FOREST 127 



stitutional ; but the debate and the vote hung on the 

 lumber issue. Another peculiarity was that southern 

 members voted solidly for forest reservations under 

 national control in their own mountains; this in 

 marked contrast with the South's traditional opposi- 

 tion to centralization of government. 



It will be seen that a mighty change has taken 

 place in public sentiment. 



Between the Weeks Act of 191 1 and the Clarke- 

 McNary Act of 1924 elapsed a period of consoli- 

 dation, reconstruction, study, growth and prepara- 

 tion. The Weeks Act dropped the curtain on an 

 unholy past. The Clarke-McNary Act lifted it to a 

 sane future. 



Meantime conservation had become a national 

 creed. The people had awakened, and preservation 

 was the word of the hour. Wild life conservation 

 hastened its already vigorous stride. National, state, 

 and local organizations were born to protect the 

 birds, the beasts, the wild flowers. Many hundreds 

 of organizations of many kinds united in an alliance 

 led by the National Parks Association to defend the 

 conservation of the National Parks which were at- 

 tacked in Congress by those who sought to prostitute 

 them, as once they had the forests, to the profit of 

 special interests and localities. The automobile 

 carried millions of people a year into the forest 

 where they learned to love it for its own sake. 

 States vied with the nation in creating parks and 

 forests, and many of them excelled in parks. The 



