The national forests consist largely of land reserved from the public 

 domain by Presidential proclamation under the Act of March 3, 1891. 

 These lands have always been in Federal ownership. President Theo- 

 dore Roosevelt proclaimed 148 million acres of public domain as forest 

 reserves — far more than any other President. In 1905, the forest 

 reserves were placed under the administration of the Secretary of 

 Agriculture and the Forest Service was created to administer them. 

 Later their name was changed to national forests to reflect a conserva- 

 tion policy of resource utilization rather than of preservation. 



Most of the national-forest land in the East was purchased under 

 the Weeks Law of 1911, as amended in 1924, which authorized pur- 

 chase of lands to protect the watersheds of navigable streams and for 

 timber production. 



Pursuant to the Act of June 4, 1897, the 1911 Act, and others, the 

 national forests have been administered under the dual policies of 

 sustained yield and multiple use of resources. Research has been 

 conducted mainly under the Act of May 22, 1928, as amended. 



The national forests yield water, timber, forage, recreation, game 

 and other wildlife, and minerals. Western agriculture and industry 

 are dependent on water flowing from national-forest watersheds; 

 hundreds of thousands of people earn their livelihood processing 

 timber grown on national forests ; millions of domestic livestock graze 

 national-forest ranges ; and many millions of people seek the national 

 forests for rest, relaxation, and spiritual uplift. All of the re- 

 newable resources are to be utilized at a high sustained level of pro- 

 ductivity and in harmonious relationship each with the other. This 

 is the basic policy. 



Most national-forest resources and services, such as recreation, wild- 

 life habitat, waterflow, and scenery cannot be evaluated in monetary 

 terms. There is no known way to measure the multiple intangible 

 values and services of the national forests; but the timber, forage, 

 and land alone are appraised at well over 7 billion dollars. 



The national forests are revenue-producing properties. Twenty- 

 five percent of such revenues is distributed to counties in which 

 national-forest lands are located in lieu of direct taxes. Current an- 

 nual revenues are about 100 million dollars and more than a billion 

 dollars has been received in total from the sale of national-forest 

 goods and services. National-forest payments received by the counties, 

 coupled with Federal expenditures for roads and fire control which 

 States or counties would otherwise make, substantially exceed the 

 taxes that the national forests would pay if subjected to ordinary 

 assessment and levy. 



In addition to the national forests, the Forest Service administers 

 some 65 land-utilization projects totaling over 4.5 million acres in 27 

 States. These are largely forest and range lands, submarginal for pri- 



