163 
From his training, experience and long intimate association with 
I\Ir. Pinchot in forest work, the nation may rest assured that 
under Mr. Graves not only will the National forests be sanely and 
efficiently administered, but also that the policies inaugurated by 
Gifford Pinchot will be continued and carried out. 
This brings the matter down to date for the investigation of the 
Interior Department now going on in Washintgon does not fall 
within the scope of this paper. The questions there involved are 
but incidental to the main problem that now awaits to be settled ; 
they constitute only a small part of the Conservation controversy. 
Until the investigation of the Interior Department is completed, 
the conservative thing is obviously to suspend judgment on the 
Secretary of the Interior, for before the investigation is over 
there should be ample opportunity for all the facts to be made 
known. It ought, however, to be said that to get at the truth 
of the matter one should rely on a study of the full report of the 
hearings and not on the faulty and often garbled accounts that 
appear in the newspapers. 
CONCLUSION. 
In this hasty and necessarily imperfect sketch of the Conserva- 
tion controversy many points have been passed over, but I think 
I have given the essential facts. It remains now only to direct 
attention to two points and I am done. Whatever the outcome 
of the investigation of the Interior Department, that investigation 
is, considered broadly, but a side issue. Similarly the dismissal 
of Mr. Pinchot is not the reason nor the cause of the Conserva- 
tion controversy. The difference of opinion between Mr. Ballin- 
ger and Mr. Pinchot — assuming that Mr. Ballinger is as sincere 
in his protestations in favor of Conservation as it is universally 
admitted that Mr. Pinchot is — is after all one as to method. The 
cause of the controversy lies far deeper. 
It cannot too often be said that the real questions at issue are 
these : First : Shall the remaining natural resources be con- 
served? And second: If so, shall they not be administered for 
the benefit of all the people rather than for the use and profit of 
greedy monopolies? These are the questions that are before 
Congress ; the issues that confront the nation. Unless action is 
taken, and that speedily, damage will be done that will be irrepar- 
able. Unless new laws are enacted the coal, phosphate deposits, 
minerals, oil and water powers remaining in public ownership 
will pass into private control and be lost forever to the people as a 
whole. The issue is one that touches the very life of the nation. 
The time for action is now. It is the duty of every man to be 
awake and to do his part. 
