22 2 North American Forests and Forestry 



sometimes proposed on the plea that public welfare 

 demands such favors to the lumber interests. But 

 the plea is not well founded. If silvicultural for- 

 estry cannot be made to pay without a bounty, 

 whether in the shape of exemption from taxes or 

 cash payments, it is very doubtful whether it could 

 be made permanently profitable with such an arti- 

 ficial stimulus. In the meantime, the exemption 

 would be invidious and subject to constant attacks. 

 Forest owners would have to be " in politics " all 

 the time, to protect their interests, and would soon 

 rival the railways as intentional or unintentional 

 promoters of corruption. No true friend of im- 

 proved forestry ought to advocate such dangerous 

 measures as this. 



To the author it would seem as if the solution of 

 the problem of taxing forests and lumber interests 

 would lie in the direction of taxing them on their 

 gross income instead of their property, in analogy to 

 the manner in which transportation companies are 

 taxed. Nearly all concerns which carry on lumber- 

 ing and other forms of forest exploitation on a large 

 scale in the United States are now legally organ- 

 ized as corporations. Very much of the timber- 

 lands of the country is owned by these same com- 

 panies or by others organized for the purpose. If 

 these corporations were relieved from property 

 taxes and instead contributed a percentage of their 

 gross receipts to the public expenses, it would be 

 comparatively easy to adjust the amount payable 

 with justice to all parties concerned. On the other 



