Bird - Lore 



Audubon Association and others for giving 

 out, what he called misleading statements, 

 and stated : 



"That sort of information has been 

 disseminated throughout this country, 

 and has scared the members of Congress. 

 Many members of Congress have come to 

 me within the last two or three weeks, 

 who were in favor of the Fall River Basin 

 project last session, who now say: 'Now, 

 Smith, we are in favor of this proposition — 

 we were in favor of it before — but my 

 people at home are so aroused that it 

 would be political suicide for me to vote 

 for it and I, of course, will not be able to 

 vote for it.' " 



To which Secretary of the Interior 

 Payne, a little later replied: 



"Let me say, first, about the timidity of 

 Congress: Congress is accustomed to 

 propaganda. I do not know of anybody 

 in the world so capable of measuring the 

 value of propaganda as the Congress. So 

 that I do not think the members of Con- 

 gress are terrified because of some pro- 

 paganda." 



To which Smith retorted: 



"You ask any one of them, and they will 

 tell you they are terrified and would be 

 afraid to go home, almost, if they should 

 vote for this bill." 



In addition to the National Association 

 of Audubon Societies, many other organiza- 

 tions and numerous individuals im- 

 mediately took up the cudgel in defense of 

 the Park. Chief among the other organized 

 groups may be mentioned, the American 

 Civic Association, which under the lead- 

 ership of J. Horace McFarland, has been 

 fighting battles for the Parks for many 

 years; the National Parks Association, 

 New England Conference for Protection 

 of National Parks, American Game Pro- 

 tective Association, Mazamas, Sierra 

 Clubs, and a committee of active men 

 headed by Dr. George Bird Grinnell, of 

 New York City. This Association sent 

 out 25,000 circulars calling the attention 

 of the public to the dangers that threatened 

 the Park, and asking those who received 

 the circular to file their protests with their 

 senators and congressmen. Contributions 

 were also asked for, the money to be used 

 as a National Parks Defense Fund. The 

 responses were immediate and effective, 



and the thousands of protests of outraged 

 citizens that poured into the Capitol 

 resulted in stopping further progress of 

 both of these bills and they died with the 

 adjournment of Congress on March 3. On 

 February 28, there was a Committee 

 hearing on the Walsh Bill, on which oc- 

 casion both sides of the controversy were 

 heard. The Association was represented 

 ably by our First Vice-President, Dr. T. 

 S. Palmer. However, it never came to a 

 vote in either House, but the Smith bill 

 did pass the Senate and was more than 

 once up for passage on the Unanimous 

 Consent Calendar in the House. 



Another measure in which we were 

 greatly interested was a bill for amending 

 the Water Power Act, whereby three 

 members of the President's Cabinet had 

 been authorized to grant water power 

 concessions in National Parks. The 

 amendment which we favored proposed 

 to put this authority back in the hands of 

 Congress. The move was bitterly fought 

 by our opponents, but was carried in both 

 Houses and the bill signed by the Presi- 

 dent. The sum total of the campaign to 

 date is that the friends of the Parks were 

 able to kill both the Smith and the Walsh 

 bill, and had sufficient strength left to 

 amend the Water Power Act as described 

 above. 



Action by the organizations interested 

 in the preservation of the Parks and the 

 wild life within their boundaries was not 

 taken a minute too soon. 



The contributions sent in to the 

 Association have been sufficient to meet 

 our immediate needs and have also en- 

 abled us to contribute financially to the 

 expenses of two of the organizations with 

 which we have been so intimately asso- 

 ciated in this endeavor. It should be 

 borne in mind, however, that while we 

 have won the first battle, the opposition 

 is gathering its forces for a new attack at 

 the next session of Congress, and we shall 

 have to make the fight all over again. 

 Mr. Smith has already served notice that 

 he is going to make another attempt to 

 get possession of the Fall River section 

 of the Yellowstone Park; in fact he is 



