19 



stcatl cuti-ies inado by their employes iiud iiffcerward assigued to the companies. 

 Steam saw-mills areestablislied promiscuously ou public lauds for the manufacture 

 of lumber procured from the public domain by miscellaneous trespassers. Largo 

 o^ierators employ hundreds, and in some cases thousands, of men cutting Government 

 timber and sawing it up into lumber and shingles, which, when needed and pur- 

 chased by local citizens, can only be obtained by them at prices governed by the 

 market value of timber brought over expensive transportation routes from points of 

 legitimate supply. 



Under cover of the privilege of obtaining timber and other material for the con- 

 struction of ''right-of-way " and land-grant r^-ilroads, large quantities of timber have 

 been cut and removed for export and sale. Immense damage is also inflicted by the 

 destruction of small growing trees and the spread of forest fires, resulting from afjiil- 

 ure to clear up the laud and dispose of the brush from felled trees, even in the cases 

 of authorized cutting. 



And in regard to the timber-land act of June 3^ 1878 : 



It has operated simply to promote the premature destruction of forests, the ship, 

 mcnt of their products out of the country, or for holding lands and the lumber needed 

 by the citizens at the speculative prices demanded by foreign and domestic corporations 

 acquiring a monopoly of the timber lands of the Government at nominal rates through 

 easy evasion of the terms of the law. 



Why, as a mere business proposition, timber lands worth at lowest averages from 

 $10 to $25 per acre for the standing trees or, according to accessibility and class and 

 quality of timber, worth ^25 to $100 x)er acre should bo sold by the Government f r 

 $2.'50 per acre it is not easy to perceive. 



The evils developed in its practical operation are inherent in the system and can 

 bo cured only by a repeal of the law by whicb they are prox)agated, 



Andj farther, in enlarging upon the importance of forest preservation 

 in the mountains, he says : 



The Government is now expending large sums of money in attempts to substitute 

 by artificial means the regulation of the flow of the Mississippi River which nature 

 had i)rovidedin the dense woods originally surrounding the sources of its numerous 

 tributaries. 



That wise and speedy measures should be adopted for the preservation of forests on 

 the public domain is in my opinion an incontrovertible proposition. To this end 

 I recommend the immediate withdrawal from appropriation, sale, or disposal of all 

 the public forests and of lands valuable chiefly for timber, subject to future legislation 

 for the permanent reservation of designated areas and a more economically-governed 

 disposal of such timber lands or timber as it mny not bo necessary indefinitely to re- 

 serve. 



In 1886: 



Depredations upon the ijublio timber by powerful corporations, wealthy mill-men, 

 lumber companies, and nuscrupulous monopolists are still being committed to an 

 alarming extent and to the great detriment of the public at large. 



An immense pressure is brought to bear upon the legislative and executive branches 

 of the Government to the end of securing immunity for past and unlimited privileges 

 for future spoliations of public timber lands, all ostensibly urged in the interest of 

 bona fide ''agriculturists" or "miners," but notoriously in fact to forward gigantic 

 schemes of speculation and monopoly in the remaining forests of the United States. 



Eeplying to a request for a change of construction, so as to permit 

 mill-owners to cut timber for thejr mills on land that might be mineral, 

 (he Commissioner writes : 



The act itself is injudicious and entirely too broad, and its rejieal or modification 

 has been recommended by you (the Secretary) for the reason that its provisions ig- 



