340 REPORT OF THE FORESTRY COMMITTEE 



PROPER CONTROL ALL IMPORTANT 



WE have not entered into a discussion of administrative features for, 

 after all, no matter how important this may be, it sinks into insignifi- 

 cance as compared with the greater question, that is: whether the 

 public interest in these great resources is to be preserved. If one-half the time 

 were devoted to constructive criticism and efforts to correct mistakes that is 

 devoted to abuse and destructive criticism of matters of administration, correc- 

 tion and advance could be speedily made. 



"Once a public ownership is surrendered, the three great resources of the 

 forest, — timber, water and forage, — are rapidly monopolized for private advan- 

 tage." This statement can be confirmed over and over again by facts which can- 

 not be disputed. Let the public forest once be abandoned, and the mistake is 

 remediless. The attempt now being made at the request of more than a dozen 

 States to restore the denuded areas of the Appalachian range is an excellent 

 illustration of what will certainly follow. First, under the guise of development, 

 the forests will pass into private hands with all the results of private ownership. 

 After this, the people have an object lesson of what it means. They do not then 

 appeal to their own State to recreate the forests, but the appeal is made to the 

 Federal Congress to appropriate the money to restore that which should never 

 have bten destroyed. 



The sole question in this whole controversy is what agency will best secure 

 results? The forests are as national as the rivers they help to maintain and as 

 broad in their influence as the plains for which they store the life-giving water. 

 The Nation is paying the cost of their protection. The States get the greatest 

 benefit at no expense. It would seem that every one except those directly inter- 

 ested in profiting thereby has all to lose and nothing to gain by a transfer from 

 Nation to State. 



The mjectmg of the claim of the two sovereignties, State and Nation, into- 

 the discussion of questions of a public nature is not a new one. It is sometimes 

 done for the purpose of creating confus.ion, of finding a twilight zone in which 

 there is no apparent authority. The purpose often is not the protection of the 

 public interests, but rather escaping from any public control or obligation. 

 Mr. Bryan, in a speech at Kansas City, stated the matter aptly when he said : 



"My observation is that you very seldom have a conflict between the 

 State and Nation unless some private interest is attempting to ignore the 

 rights of both State and Nation. Back of this controversy which we hear 

 suggested betweer the State and Nation you will find the interest of the 

 predatory corporation that is as much an enemy to the people of the State as 

 to the people of the Nation." 



But the predatory motives are by no means the only ones which can utilize 

 this movement. The politician who seeks through misrepresentation to foster 

 among Western voters a belief in fictitious State benefits, and unwarranted 

 resentment of presumed federal injury, and this for his own political advantage, 

 should merit no public or private sanction. 



