Timber Depletion and the Answer. 11 



assist the respective States in fire protection, methods of cutting 

 forests, reforestation, and the classification of lands as between 

 timber production and agriculture. It should carry an initial 

 annual appropriation of not less than $1,000,000, expendable in 

 cooperation with the States, with a proviso that the amount expended 

 in any State during any year shall not exceed the expenditures of 

 the State for the same purposes. The Secretary of Agriculture 

 should be authorized, in making such expenditures, to require 

 reasonable standards in the disposal of slashings, the protection of 

 timbered and cut-over lands from fire, and the enforcement of 

 equitable requirements in cutting or extracting forest products 

 which he deems necessary to prevent forest devastation in the 

 region concerned, and to withhold cooperation, in whole or in part, 

 from States which do not comply with these standards in their 

 legislative or administrative measures. Federal activities under 

 this law should not be restricted to the watersheds of navigable 

 streams but should embrace any class of forest lands in the co- 

 operating States. 



This law, greatly extending the very limited Federal aid now given 

 to the States in fire protection, will enable the Forest Service to 

 organize and carry forward a Nation-wide drive against the chief cause 

 of devastation — forest fires; and to secure the adoption of such other 

 measures as may be needed in particular forest regions to stop 

 denudation. It will also aid States and private owners in restock- 

 ing lands already denuded, where tree growth will not come back 

 of itself. 



(2) The Extension and Consolidation of Federal Forest Holdings. 



Legislation is needed, in part as an extension of section 1 of the 

 act of March 1, 1911 (Weeks law), which will permit the rapid en- 

 largement of the National Forests and the consolidation of existing 

 Forest units for more effective administration. This legislation 

 should : 



(A) Continue the purchase of forest or cut-over lands, as initiated 

 under the Weeks Act, with annual appropriations of at least 

 $2,000,000. 



(B) Authorize the Secretary of Agriculture to exchange National 

 Forest land, timber, or transferable timber certificates for private 

 timbered or cut-over land within or adjoining existing National 

 Forests. 



(C) Withhold from any form of alienation, except under the 

 mineral laws, all lands now in Government ownership or control 

 but not embraced in National Forests or National Parks, including 

 canceled patents or grants, unreserved public lands, and Indian and 



