Chapter XXV: Act 333: provided for conservation of natural gas and oil by preventing (3)

But agricultural education will conserve something more than the fertility of the soil and the vitality and purity of our crops. It means also the conservation of a prosperous, virile, self-dependent, and intelligent people. It means a prosperous people, for no cost of education of the right kind was ever known to impoverish a people, and no expenditure rightly made could ever equal the gain. Conservation can never be expected of the ignorant. Conservation is but the larger and more altruistic expression of the term known as thrift; and ignorance and poverty know it not. The means for extending and improving agricultural education will develop and expand in the same measure that we apply ourselves to the problem.

Agricultural colleges have not rendered the assistance that they should in extending agricultural education, because their field has been too restricted. Excellent as their instruction may be, it reaches only a very small percentage of our people directly. Their scope and activities must be enlarged till their influence is felt in every community. They should not be shut out from participating in the work of general education as they now are in many instances. In a measure we repudiate the findings of science, and discount the progress we have made, in not providing a wider application for our researches. There is at present no adequate means for the dissemination of the vast body of knowledge that alone will save to us our own great underlying industry of agriculture.

The world has oftentimes tried the experiment of building a State upon other foundations than that of a conservative agriculture and an intelligent and prosperous agricultural class, and always with the same fatal outcome. The grandeur of cities, the glory and might of great armies, the highest culture in the arts, and the noblest of religions and philosophies, will not suffice to save the nation that knows not nature and defies her laws. That State but hastens the day of its own destruction that fails to train its citizens in the right use and management of their land holdings. No jealous interest of whatever worth in itself should be given consideration at the expense of that which maintains all of our interests.

North Dakota has been favored by nature with a soil so productive that, properly tilled and conserved, it will feed one-tenth of the present population of the entire Nation. It is an asset such as few nations ever possessed, and it should be so safeguarded that its great contribution to the Nation's existence may steadily increase. The one way to do this is to teach the land owners that Conservation in agriculture means not only patriotism and good citizenship but prosperity as well, that useful education at any price is always cheap and ignorance costly, and that no values can be more stable and certain than those lying in productive farm lands.

The patriotic sentiment that leads men to sacrifice time and money that our natural resources may be conserved is most commendable. Of still more service is he who aids in developing a system of education that shall teach men to conserve the natural resources entrusted to their own hands. The task is a great one, but not beyond the range of possibility; and upon its successful accomplishment rests the welfare of the whole Nation.

REPORT FROM OHIO

WILLIAM R. LAZENBY

_Ohio State University_

_Chairman Executive Committee of the Society for Horticultural Science_

The welfare of our country, as well as that of the States composing it, depends on a wise Conservation of its rich and varied natural resources. Many of these resources have been so bountiful, and apparently so inexhaustible, that we have drawn upon them without a thought of their limitations of the dire effects of their exhaustion.

Speaking especially for Ohio, I trust it will be understood that by "Conservation" I mean an honest effort to make that State a good one to live in for all of us now there, and for all who may come after us.

In addition to the three problems named below, other Conservation questions will doubtless require attention; but for these, every instinct of justice and humanity insists that we accord them instant and earnest consideration.

1--_The Forestry Problem_

I place this first, because the influence of the forests is so far-reaching, and we have no clear-cut, well-defined policy in Ohio designed to preserve, improve, and extend our forests.

Ohio has an area of 41,000 square miles, and has been tremendously rich in hardwood timber. We have cut down this timber most improvidently, with no effort to restore the supply, and so far as the State is concerned are now on the verge of a timber famine. In 1900, according to the Twelfth United States Census, Ohio ranked seventh as a lumber-producing State, being exceeded by Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, New York, Minnesota, and Maine. Since then she has dropped to the nineteenth rank, and bids fair in the near future, unless prompt and vigorous action is taken, to have so little timber left as not to be rated at all. The effects of this wholesale removal of our forests may be briefly summarized as follows:

(1) We are compelling those who come after us to pay an almost prohibitive price for lumber, and are likely to see an end of some of the most important wood-consuming industries of the State. As a source of wood supply our forests touch the interests of all. We are a universally wood-consuming as well as food-consuming people.

(2) The recent floods in the river-valleys of Ohio, which have caused losses of life and of property valued at millions, have followed and will continue to follow the denudation of our hills by excessive tree-cutting, followed by fire.

(3) In many places the erosion or wash caused by the rapid run-off of the rain and melting snow is reducing the deforested hills to barren wastes, and is covering much of the fertile soil of the valleys with sterile sand and gravel.

The forest problem is the great Conservation problem in Ohio. It affects the State, because it concerns every citizen of the State, and it can only be solved by action of the State and the Nation.

2--_The Waterway Problem_

In my opinion this question comes next in importance. By waterways I mean not only navigable streams and canals, but power sites on non-navigable as well as navigable streams. If the forests are properly managed, water will be an unfailing source of power. No few men, nor any special interest, should control these sources of power, for this means a control of all industry that depends on power. Our waterways may not be so enormously valuable as those of some other States, and this is all the more reason why they should be conserved for the public good.

We shall be needlessly mortgaging the future by allowing any special class or interest to use our waterways and water-power sites without making some direct payment for these valuable privileges. This is important not only for State revenue, but as a recognition of the principle that what belongs to the people should not be absolutely surrendered to private interests. There is great value in our undeveloped water-power. An engineer's inventory of all the waters of the State, with their possibilities of power, would cause Ohio to sit up and take notice.

If forests and waterways were properly conserved, we would hear less from railroads and power companies of the enormous bill of expense from floods at one time, and loss from low water at another.

3--_The Mineral Problem_

Ohio is rich in coal, oil, gas, stone, clay, sand, and other mineral resources. These should be carefully catalogued, so that the people could know more about the material assets of the State.

Mineral lands should be sold only to those who are prepared to develop them, and under conditions that will prevent the improvident waste of reckless exploitation. For the present it is probable that the actual development or working of the mineral properties of the State can best be done by private interests acting under some public control, but the State has no moral right to permit such valuable privileges to pass from its control for nothing in return. It is only by some form of National and State Conservation that we can secure an abundant and continuous supply of such primal necessities as wood, water-power, and coal.

* * * * *

The control of animal diseases and of insect and fungus pests that are spread by interstate transportation, and the preservation of migratory birds, which are our best allies in fighting injurious insects, are vital subjects for the consideration of a National Conservation Congress. The control and destruction of enemies and the protection and multiplication of friends by the concentrated and cooperative action of the States are subjects that clearly come within the scope and interest of National Conservation.

Conservation can only be effective by good laws faithfully executed. By proper legislation we can encourage the reforestation of our denuded hillsides and stimulate the planting and care of valuable timber trees through relieving such land from undue taxation. Timber should be taxed like other property, when cut; but to tax land and its timber crop every year is manifestly unjust.

In order to rightly conserve our forests we should furnish good opportunities for young men to become well trained in forestry. For this our schools of forestry must be well equipped. I am pleased to state that Ohio has made a splendid beginning in this direction; and there is no reason, if properly supported, why this centrally located State should not have one of the best forestry schools in the country.

What is needed to properly investigate the conditions and formulate a Conservation policy for the State is a good Conservation Commission. In addition to this, we need more thought, more study, more science, on the part of the public, concerning the natural resources of the State, with less blind devotion to the old ways and means of doing things, which if ever judicious, have long ceased to be so.

REPORT FROM OKLAHOMA

BENJ. MARTIN

I have the honor to represent as a Delegate to this Congress the Muskogee Commercial Club of Muskogee, one of the leading organizations of Oklahoma, under the influence of which the city of Muskogee grew from a town of 4,000 inhabitants in 1900 to its present population of 30,000.

A distinguished citizen of a neighboring State, on a recent visit to our city, constituted himself a Grand Jury and indicted each citizen of larceny. He charges that Oklahoma for years had been stealing from the other States of the Union some of their best brain and brawn, until now we have approximately two millions of the choicest sons and daughters of the American Republic. To this indictment we now offer ourselves for arraignment before this Congress, and plead guilty, and we are ready to receive our sentence without a plea that justice be tempered with mercy. As to other charges of wrongdoing on the part of some of Oklahoma's distinguished sons, which have been much heralded in the press, I most emphatically enter a plea of "Not guilty," either in law or morals; and time will completely vindicate them.

The resources of Oklahoma are vast, far beyond the conception or knowledge of those who have resided within her borders for many years. Conservation is of particular importance to us, for yet our resources are practically in their virgin state. We heartily join hands with you of our sister States in this great movement, in my opinion due to the work and wisdom of Gifford Pinchot more than any other American citizen. However, his ideas and earnestness were very fully and heartily appreciated by that foremost American, Theodore Roosevelt, to whom for his great work in inaugurating and fostering Federal Conservation we give honor.

Chief among our resources are the vast variety of agricultural products which grow in great abundance. In the same field may be seen growing enormous yields of corn, cotton, oats, wheat, and alfalfa. No other State can excel Oklahoma in the production of these products. We join the great corn-belt of Illinois and Iowa in singing the song of Whittier--

Heap high the farmer's wintry hoard,
Heap high the golden corn;
No richer gift has autumn poured
From out her lavish horn.

Let other lands exulting glean
The apple from the pine,
The orange from its glossy green,
The cluster from the vine.

We better love the hardy gift
Our rugged vales bestow,
To cheer us when the storm shall drift
Our harvest fields with snow.

The following extract is from the First Biennial Report of the Oklahoma State Board of Agriculture:

"Oklahoma is the greatest country on earth, not only because we can grow everything here that can be grown anywhere else in the United States, but because many crops we can grow here are decidedly more profitable than are crops of like character in many other sections of the country."

We join our sister States of Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Tennessee, Alabama, and others in the endeavor to conserve their vast deposits of coal, not solely from patriotic motives, but also because of our extensive coal, oil, and gas fields, only a small part of which have yet been developed. The supply of timber in the eastern and southeastern portions of our State is worthy of the consideration and protection of the Conservation movement. Particularly rich is our State in its streams of water and its water-power. The principal rivers are the Arkansas, the Grand, the Verdegris, the Canadian, the Cimarron, the Washita, and the Red, the latter forming the boundary between Oklahoma and Texas. These streams within themselves contain great resources, yet in the virgin state, awaiting but to be developed and utilized by American genius.

I know of no more appropriate way of closing my statement than in the words of Colonel John A. Joyce--

The rolling hills and mountains,
Without their forest dress
Will soon bring to the Nation
Great hunger and distress;
And if we do not listen
To the scientific strain,
The soil of grand Columbia
Will be washed away by rain.

Brave nature in her glory
Works for animated things,
And tells the old, old story
Of feeding serfs and kings;
But man, obtuse and greedy,
Will not listen in his pain
To the poor, and weak, and needy,
Who must live by sun and rain.

We must save the soil and water,
Or a desert there will be
For wife, and son, and daughter,
In this land of Liberty.
And the Congress of the Nation,
Must now listen to the brain
Of our scientific sages
Who would husband soil and rain.

REPORT FROM OREGON

E. T. ALLEN

_Assistant Secretary Oregon Conservation Commission_

Oregon's chief Conservation advances of late have been the passage of progressive water laws, by the effort of the State Conservation Commission, and the progress of private timber owners in the prevention of forest fires. The most urgent task now on hand is to secure more liberal State aid in forest protection.

Immediately following the Conference of Governors at the White House in 1908, Governor Chamberlain appointed for Oregon a Conservation Commission of 15 members. This semi-official Commission was reduced to 7 members, and given statutory standing and a small appropriation, by Act of Legislature filed February 23, 1909. Its work is "To ascertain and make known the natural resources of the State of Oregon, and to cooperate with the National Conservation Commission to the end that the natural resources of the State may be conserved and put to the highest use."

No legislative session has been held since the statutory Commission was appointed. In its earlier form, however, it recommended and secured the passage, by the same Legislature which gave it official standing, of a workable law for the development of Carey act projects, and one for complete State control of waters within the State. Both have proved excellent, no defects of importance having developed.

The Oregon water law, in particular, is generally regarded as an example of good State action. It is based on the police power of the State to preserve the public peace and safety of its water users. Under this law, rights to the use of water for power development are limited to a period of 40 years. A simple and expeditious method is provided for determining early water rights, protecting existing rights, and acquiring new rights. Prior rights are determined by a Board of Control consisting of the State Engineer and the division superintendents of the two water divisions into which the State is divided. Established rights are protected by a water master in each district of a division, acting under the direction of the division superintendent. He may make arrests and compel the installment of suitable devices for controlling the use of water. New rights are granted by certificate of the Board of Control, after proof, under a system based on priority of application and beneficial use. Water for irrigation is made appurtenant to the land irrigated. Oregon also has a law providing for a State tax, on a horsepower basis, upon water-power projects.

Oregon has a non-partisan State Board of Forestry, consisting of representatives of the industries and agencies chiefly concerned in forest management and protection; also an excellent forest code, so far as punitive and regulative provisions are concerned. It lacks appropriation or machinery to make this code effective. To secure such provision by the next Legislature is the chief present work of the Commission. The Commission works under the plan of attacking one point at a time, instead of dissipating efforts among all the improvements needed. Water and water-power were felt to be the most urgent, forestry is considered next, and when the forest laws are made satisfactory, other branches of Conservation will receive concentrated effort.

There is also an Oregon Conservation Association which, under the same plan, is now chiefly devoted to carrying out the work of the State Board of Forestry for which no appropriation exists. Its secretary is secretary of the State Board, and the funds of the Association help to pay postage and clerical help derived by the State.

Under an alliance called the Oregon Forest Fire Association, affiliated in turn with the Western Forestry and Conservation Association embracing five States from Montana to California, a large number of the private forest owners of Oregon cooperate to secure better protection from forest fires. These owners spend from $50,000 a year upward for patrol and fire-fighting, their employees having authority from the State as fire wardens.

Among the Conservation problems to be taken up next in Oregon are the protection of fisheries, good roads, improvement in technical methods in irrigation and dry-land farming, topographic surveys, and inventories of State resources.

REPORT FROM RHODE ISLAND

HENRY A. BARKER

_Chairman Rhode Island Conservation Commission_

This Conservation Congress has been so very generous with its invitations that it happens that about every organization in which I am interested has been asked to send Delegates. As a result, quite a good lot of them have been so kind as to bestow this honor upon me--most of them prudently waiting until they found out that I was coming anyhow. For that reason my desk in Providence is adorned with a nice little pile of beautifully engraved cards, each telling me that this City of Saint Paul takes pleasure in extending its hospitality, etc. Along with each of them came other cards to warn me that if I wanted hotel accommodations I had better speak quick. So I spoke with reasonable speed--and eminently satisfactory results; but I am glad I did not have to find accommodations for all of the Delegates that I seem to be.

I want to say, also, that if it gives the cordial City of Saint Paul pleasure to extend this charming invitation, the pleasure is entirely mutual; I am delighted to accept the hospitality.

I am glad that I need not report at this time for anything except the State of Rhode Island, and I am sure you will be. You may ask, "What has Rhode Island to conserve?" In reply I want to tell you that no State in the Union in proportion to its population has so much that needs conserving. Some of our friends from the Far West tell us heartbreaking things about how the Government has reserved or restricted so much of the western area that there isn't enough left to make farms and villages on. I think I heard day before yesterday that in the State where I attended the First Conservation Congress last year there were Government reservations as big as Massachusetts and Rhode Island combined--though I should say these wouldn't necessarily look so very big when painted on the map of Washington, or seriously hamper the operations of its people. And we have this sad condition contrasted with that of the happy East where the Government owns no reservations at all; but back in the East we do not realize that this is a good fortune. Never having had any land in our part of New England owned either by the State or by the Nation, we have been somewhat frantically endeavoring to have them secure some for the good of our people, even though it now has to be bought. Everybody knows how earnestly we wish that the Government might have done for us at the beginning of our settlement just what the Government is able to do, and is doing, for the West today. There isn't any talk of "State rights" in the East. It is a question of the States' necessities. The Eastern States are all working to their utmost to get the Government to undertake certain enterprises like the Appalachian White Mountain reservations, that are of an interstate character; but each State expects to cooperate for as much of the remaining work as it can.

You will be glad to know that Little Rhody is trying to do its share. It always does its share. It always matches the Government, at least dollar for dollar, on any public improvement work. Just now it is spending a million dollars on the harbor of Providence to match another million that the Government appropriated last year. That is the kind of "State rights" the Government gives it. But not much compared with what the railroads are putting in.

The formal establishment of a Conservation Commission was almost the very last act of the Rhode Island Legislature at its special session, only about two weeks ago. We didn't expect, of course, to be quite so much up to date, or so early in any new field, as our brethren in Montana for example, though we have had a Conservation Commission, rather informally appointed by the Governor, ever since that notable gathering of the Governors at Washington, and work that such a commission would naturally do has been going on, under other names, longer than I can remember.

The aim of the new Commission is to secure the maximum of efficiency and the minimum of politics. I do not know what the political affiliations of its members are, or if they have any, and I do not believe the Legislature knows. It is made up of ex officio members, to bring into efficient cooperation several well-established departments that have long dealt with some phase or other of Conservation. The head of the Bureau of Industrial Statistics, which is conducting a State survey of natural resources, including soil analysis; the Secretary of the State Board of Agriculture; the Director of the Experiment Station of the State College; the State Forester; and the Secretary of the Metropolitan Park Commission--these departments will now contribute their efforts to a common purpose. The State Forestry Department, with advice from the National Forest Service, has been getting some very up to date forest laws passed, and the Park Commission has made a visible beginning to secure for public use and preservation some necessary recreation places for the over-crowding population of the Providence "Metropolitan District," which has about four-fifths of the population within about four-fifths of the area of the Twin Cities combined.

The State College, assisted by the U. S. Bureau of Soils, has been showing such farmers as care to take notice that southern New England is a very different sort of place agriculturally than it has been the habit to suppose, and that at least three ears of corn may be made to grow, where, previously, one went to the dogs--or the hogs. The very fact that there are more ever-hungry mouths to feed and more manufactures to the square inch in southern New England than there are anywhere else makes this necessary. We must care for every drop of water that falls on our hillsides. The cities need it; the manufacturers need it (and can use it first); the great bleacheries--that furnish about all the textiles that all of you use and wear--need all they can have; and the people need the lakesides and the river banks for recreation as in the past.

At present our markets get most of their "fine Rhode Island turkeys" from Vermont and their "new-laid eggs" from beyond the Mississippi. A large part of the Rhode Island greenings and Massachusetts Baldwin apples come from Oregon and Washington, though not because they refuse to grow in their native habitat. But much of the soil must have put back into it those elements which previous unscientific generations robbed it of. And here is an amusing paradox: With a population growing in density faster than in any other State of the Union, and with more markets just around the corner, there are, nevertheless, more acres of forest-covered lands and more acres of unutilized lands in Rhode Island than there were 50 years ago--and more in proportion than in almost any other State in the Union.

Well, that's where Rhode Island comes in, in this Conservation movement; and it has come in none too soon. If it had only had a wise and paternal Government to help it administer and develop its natural resources a century ago, the cost of living would be less today for every one of its inhabitants.

Rhode Island has awakened to vital things, but even if it had only an indirect interest in Conservation it would still feel that it owed its moral influence to the country as a whole, and that it is not a separate selfish little two-cent republic all by its lonesome, but a part of a great Nation that prefers to be governed from Washington rather than from Wall Street: a Nation whose prosperity and power and glory need the cooperation and loyalty of every one of its citizens.

REPORT FROM SOUTH CAROLINA

E. J. WATSON

_Commissioner of Agriculture_

_Chairman State Conservation Commission_

South Carolina Commission's full report delayed, so report briefly by wire. Active work has been done. A preliminary forest survey has been made, and a complete measure for conservation of forests and protection against forest fires has been introduced in the General Assembly and will be pushed during the coming session. Active steps have been taken toward drainage and reclamation of coastal lands, and a measure to provide for a complete system under the direction of the State Commission is now being prepared for introduction in the Legislature in January next. Conservation of human resources has been greatly advanced in the past two years, following the enactment of complete factory inspection laws. No State is giving more attention to conservation of all her resources at this time than is South Carolina. I am heartily in sympathy with everything making for Conservation, and greatly regret I cannot be with you at the Congress.

REPORT FROM SOUTH DAKOTA

DOANE ROBINSON

_Secretary Conservation Commission of South Dakota_

The South Dakota Conservation Commission, consisting of Senator Robert J. Gamble (Chairman), Eben W. Martin, Samuel H. Lea, O. C. Dokken, and Doane Robinson (Secretary), was appointed by Governor Coe I. Crawford in August, 1908, and has been continued by Governor Vessey.

The Commission made a preliminary report on the resources of the State in December, 1908. It has been unprovided with funds, but the newspapers of the State and of the Northwest have been open to its use, and from the beginning the policy was adopted of furnishing a weekly letter, educational in its nature, pertaining to the State's resources and their Conservation. These articles have received very wide publicity, both within and without the State.

The Commission acted as Executive Committee of the South Dakota Conservation and Development Congress called by Governor Vessey and held at Pierre June 29-July 1, 1910. This was an exceptionally successful Congress, in which nearly two thousand citizens participated. Every county was represented, and the interest was very marked. The program consisted of addresses and papers educational in character, many speakers of national reputation participating. An annual Congress is contemplated.

REPORT FROM TEXAS

WILL L. SARGENT

_Secretary Conservation Association of Texas_

The interests of Conservation in Texas are promoted largely by a voluntary organization of citizens, the Conservation Association of Texas. The Association held a Congress at Fort Worth in April last, at which much enthusiasm was manifested, and plans and policies were adopted, largely in the form of resolutions. The substance of these resolutions forms the body of this report.

We lay especial stress on the dirt roads of our State. Considering our great farming interests and their numerous and increasing yearly output, and the impassable condition of roads during certain seasons, we urge upon our county and State authorities the immediate betterment of our Texas roads by drainage, split-log drag, top-gravel dressing, or other up-to-date methods.

As the services of a large number of experts are necessary for the intelligent guidance and direction of all plans of Conservation in all lines, and as intelligent workers are necessary for the effective carrying out of such plans, we urge upon our legislative authorities, as the necessary foundation for all Conservation the better financial support of our great public school system, the introduction of agricultural and industrial studies into these schools, and the better equipment and maintenance of our higher educational institutions, and that more substantial financial support be accorded to the Agricultural and Mechanical College, and the Department of Agriculture, and that adequate appropriation be made for those institutions and for farmers' institutes to the end that the supply of experts and leaders may be made more nearly adequate to the needs of our rapidly growing State.

We know from past experiences that the overflow of our rivers and streams have resulted in washing away not only a great deal of rich and fertile soil, thereby injuring the lands of our farmers, but that these floods have destroyed crops running into millions of dollars in value and brought destruction and ruin to hundreds of our most worthy citizens. We earnestly recommend that the Legislature shall pass such laws as will constitutionally and in practical and adequate way prevent or curtail such losses in the future, the details of which can be worked out at the proper time and in an appropriate way by the legislative body itself.

We deplore the wasteful methods of lumbering practiced in Texas and look with dismay at the early day (say fifteen years) when all our best timber will be cut and unobtainable except at great cost, when the cut-over land, littered with dead branches and decayed treetops, will be annually burned over, the humus destroyed and the soil become unfit for cultivation and washed into the streams. We also apprehend with dismay the direful effects resultant upon our Texas climate when the timber is gone and the forest area has become a grassy, burned-over waste. We urgently recommend to the people of Texas that they call upon the Legislature for the establishment of a forestry department, under charge of a trained forester, and under control of the State Agricultural Department; and it shall be the duty of said forester also to lecture in both the University and the Agricultural and Mechanical College, and take charge of all forestry work in the State, and his work shall be in connection with the Forest Service of the United States Government, for the saving of the forest remnant in our State and the replanting of the cut-over area on lands not suitable for agricultural purposes.

We believe in a strict conservation and preservation of the public domain of Texas in a way that will best encourage homesteaders, and that all laws made for the protection of the State and the people against fraudulent entries or the illegal acquisition of the public domain on the part of private citizens or corporations should be strictly enforced, and we recommend to the next Legislature the passage of a law making it a felony against all persons knowingly and fraudulently entering into conspiracy to acquire any portion of the public domain in violation of the laws of Texas made for the benefit of actual settlers.

Recognizing the importance of fish as a food supply for our people, we indorse such laws as have already been enacted for the purifying of our rivers and lakes and such further legislation along that line as conditions demand, and recommend that hatcheries for the propagation and protection of fish be established and maintained by the State.

We indorse the work of the Texas Audubon Society in behalf of the wild birds of Texas, and urge that the next Legislature shall enact laws for the better protection of the birds, to the end that their extermination be prevented, so that they may be allowed to increase in numbers, delighting the world with their beauty and song, and also serving the economic purpose for which they were created, namely, the protection of crops by the extermination of insect enemies.

We congratulate the farmers of Texas for adopting modern methods in tilling the soil and in a diversification of crops. The great and beneficial results that have come to them through this system have clearly demonstrated its practicality.

The Legislature is asked to pass a law covering the features now partially covered by several independent laws and providing for a State Department of Engineering, which department shall be authorized to make surveys, maps, and estimates looking to the reclamation of overflow and wet lands anywhere within the State, and further being authorized to examine and approve all the plans and estimates of such improvements before said improvements can be accomplished, by this means being empowered to mutually protect all interests involved, whether these interests are at present active or in the future probable.

In order to carry out most economically the Conservation of the wealth latent in the soil and water supply of Texas, we recommend the enactment of legislation which will provide means and instrumentalities for a soil and water survey of the State as a basis for the earliest possible development of such wealth for the common good.

We recognize in the reclamation of our arid lands one of the greatest factors in the future development of the State, because of the million acres of fertile lands that can and should be reclaimed by irrigation. Recognizing all vested rights, we encourage the conservation, storage, and equitable distribution of natural and flood waters of streams, artesian wells, springs, rainfall, and other sources of water supply. We favor a uniform system of irrigation laws that will give security for the investment of capital in the development of irrigation projects, and at the same time fully protect and safeguard the users of water and define the rights as well as the obligations of the enterprises delivering the water to them. We favor the State never parting with title to her water-power and the control of her streams to corporations or private individuals; we favor legislation that will secure the aid of the State in its conservation and reclamation work, such as the construction of reservoirs to be used for power, for irrigation, as well as for domestic and other purposes. The State is requested to enact a law creating an irrigation commission, acting under the direction of the Commissioner of Agriculture, whose duties shall be fully defined by statute.

We heartily endorse the purposes and objects of the National Conservation Association, and urge all the friends of Conservation in Texas to cooperate by becoming members of the National Conservation Association.

Recognizing that the prosperity and the happiness of our people depend on the utmost protection of their health and the protection of their domestic animals from disease, we recommend that the Legislature appropriate sufficient funds for the maintenance of the State Board of Health and the State Sanitary Board.

Recognizing the great value of the experiment stations and demonstration farms located in the various agricultural sections of our State, we indorse the work of the stations already established, and recommend that a law be passed authorizing the County Commissioners of each county to provide, at their discretion, for such stations and demonstration farms, in order that the most approved methods of agriculture may be exemplified and new facts may be determined.

We believe it would be advisable for the Congress of the United States to pass a law repealing all laws authorizing the sale of any of the public domain in the United States and its Territories, including the Philippine Islands and other possessions, and in the future only sell the surface for agriculture and stock raising purposes, and forever retain title in the people of the United States of the timber and of all minerals and all coal, oil, gases, phosphates, water and water-powers, to be worked under control of laws passed by Congress by paying a reasonable royalty to the people for the same.

REPORT FROM UTAH

O. J. SALISBURY

_Vice-President Utah State Conservation Commission_

The Utah State Conservation Commission was authorized by an Act of the State Legislature approved March 22, 1909. The Act prescribed the powers and duties of the Commission, and appropriated a certain sum annually to be expended for the purposes thereof. Pursuant to the said Act the Governor of the State duly appointed a Commission, consisting of seven members, who organized and began active operations about the first day of October, 1909.

Such legislation was called for and enacted on account of the pressing necessity of devising ways and means of preserving and protecting the abundant, varied, and valuable natural resources of our young and growing State; and it was a source of gratification to this Commission to find that such resources had suffered comparatively little waste in the years past, and that the duties required of the Commission were to ascertain the character and extent of the State's resources, and to work along lines of Conservation and protection rather than those of restoration.

The Commission prepared and issued a preliminary report on the resources of the State late in the year 1909, and 2000 copies were distributed to our State legislators, to Government departments, Conservation associations, public libraries, etc. Owing to the short time in which the Commission had to collect data and prepare the report, it was somewhat limited in its scope and general in its character.

The Commission has now in course of preparation a complete map of the State, showing the National Forests, ownership of public lands (whether Federal or State), character of the soils with analyses thereof, with other information to enable it to make an intelligent and accurate report to the Governor and State Legislature at the coming session in 1911, suggesting and recommending such legislation as will best conserve and protect the State's natural resources to the benefit and advantage of our citizens of present and future generations.

The amount of the annual appropriation for the purposes of the Commission is $3,000.00. There was expended during the year 1909 the sum of $211.55, and during the year 1910 the sum of $2,767.62.

It is the intention and purpose of the Commission to continue along the lines upon which it has started, to ascertain the extent and character and point out the location of the agricultural, mineral, power, and other natural resources of the State, and to place before the public such information concerning these resources as will enable the home-seeker, the investor, the manufacturer and all those seeking industrial pursuits adapted to our State, to secure for themselves some of the advantages which the development of such resources offers.

SUPPLEMENTARY REPORT FROM UTAH

E. T. MERRITT

_Delegate from Utah_

The State of Utah has not yet undertaken any great work in the matter of Conservation of public resources, although a Commission has been created with the Governor as chairman. An office is maintained and the gentlemen of the Commission are giving earnest thought and study to the issues involved, feeling that they want to be sure they are right before they go ahead. However, the General Government has been very liberal in the attention it has given us, and we find our phosphate lands, the public coal lands, lands adjoining streams suitable for power sites, and practically every acre of our forest lands have been withdrawn from entry. And yet we feel that we have no quarrel with the Government in these matters. We believe that just as soon as equitable and reasonable methods have been devised for the sale or lease of the first three named they will be placed in such a position to be of practical use and benefit to the people, as they should be; in other words, we do not believe they will be bottled up or pickled or preserved for future generations, but under wise and equitable laws and administration will be converted to the use of the people.

The forest reserves are properly cared for in Utah, and their use and administration is equitable and fair. Mr Pinchot told us when he began his administration that while no doubt mistakes would be made and some inconvenience suffered by the people, yet he wanted it understood that the forests belonged to the people, and that the purpose of the Government was not to exploit them for revenue or for glory or for the fun there was in it, but rather to take care of them for the use and benefit of the people, especially for the people who had conquered and developed the adjoining country; to conserve the water supply, and to perpetuate and care for all the resources and homes of the people. He further told us that whenever we could suggest betterment of the Service in the interest of the people, such suggestions would be gladly welcomed. Such promises have been faithfully carried out, and we believe the Government has been a kind parent to the State of Utah. We see no reason for a quarrel as to the rights of the State and those of the Government. We think there is plenty for both to do, and at least to us there is profit and benefit for us to go hand in hand in cooperation with the Federal Government in the development of our State.

We believe that only by the General Government can the problem of water-power sites, particularly on large or interstate streams, be handled. The history of Utah shows that some years ago the adjudication of water-rights was in the courts of the several Judicial Districts of the State, and that in the course of their procedure it was a common thing for all the water of the stream to be decreed to the several owners residing within that Judicial District, absolutely without regard to the rights of other citizens using water from the same stream, although residing in some other Judicial District. We changed our laws, placing the acquirement and adjudication of water-rights in the State Engineer. We found this a big improvement, but we still find ourselves in the matter of interstate streams entirely at the mercy of the fellow above us. Of course the fellow below can take care of himself. The lesson is obvious. We maintain that only the General Government can properly and rightly hand out justice and equity in the matter of power sites and water-rights as affecting interstate streams.

We have found cooperation with the General Government immensely valuable to us in the matter of experiments in the drainage of water-logged or alkali lands, measurement and recording of the flow of our streams, the eradication of disease among our livestock, and in fact in every department where cooperation has been tried.

We are suffering today in Utah, as in many other parts of the country, from mistakes and carelessness of the general Government in the handling of the public resources, but this is also true of ourselves in our own administration; and we are very glad to see an awakening on this subject. The people of Utah, in common with all of the people of the whole country, are deeply interested in the subject of Conservation in all its phases, and believe that the great mistakes of the past, both National and in our own State, will not be repeated.

REPORT FROM VERMONT

GEORGE AITKIN

_Vermont Conservation Commission_

The Commission on the Conservation of the Natural Resources of Vermont has no statutory existence, but was originally appointed by Governor Fletcher D. Proctor in support of the general Conservation movement instituted by the Conference of Governors at Washington in May of 1908. The Commission has been continued by parole of Governor George H. Prouty.

It has recognized and been in absolute sympathy with the principles fundamental to Conservation work, namely, that conservative use and, where practicable, the intelligent maintenance and restoration of natural resources are indispensable to the continued prosperity of State and Nation and of inter-nations; that State boundaries or National boundaries do not confine and limit natural resources; that it has become the sacred duty of State and Nation to take measures for the preservation on the people's account of all the means of their life, welfare, and comfort, including soils, water, minerals, and forests; these to be safeguarded as public utilities to be used and treated in the interests of future as well as of existing generations, and to be stripped of every vestige of monopoly and trust.

Apart from the conservation of these necessary and material things, we have been interested in the advancement also of what is nearly as, if not more, important, the conservation of health, the retention and improvement of our self-governing opportunities, the equalizing and qualification of educational opportunity, and of every phase of civic, moral and social advance. Vermont is mainly interested directly in the conservation and right use of public health, of its soil, of its forests and woodlots, of its water supplies, of its quarries of granite, marble, and slate, of its game and fish, and in its steadfast attention to educational opportunity and the administration of justice. For the greater part it possesses a very widespread individual ownership and control in all its natural resources and their development and use. It has for decades prior to the so-called Conservation movement supervised and fostered all these economies through legislation; so that it may be said that the State has gradually but definitely applied the principles of Conservation to its affairs and its resources for many years prior to the existing discussion of the subject. This is true in connection with quarrying, agriculture, forestry, and water supplies, though it should be added that Conservation subjects have been much more prominently considered in recent years with increasing advantage to the farmers of the State and also with an increase in manufactures.

Our method of legislation and the machinery of our self-government represent an evolution and are the result of much and intimate public discussion, and they are working out good economic results. Perhaps this may best be indicated by a reference to the legislation passed in 1908. There was enacted a law which abolished the Board of Agriculture, and substituted in its place a Board of Agriculture and Forestry, consisting of the Governor, the director of the State Agricultural Experiment Station, and two citizens known to be interested in the advancement of agriculture and forestry. The disbursement of the appropriation under this Act was left discretionary between agriculture and forestry, and the results in the brief elapsing period since its passage have been very gratifying. In addition to this there were acts sustaining the work of the State Agricultural College, providing for increased support of agricultural fairs, for the acquisition of forest reserves, for the appointment and maintenance of a State Forester, for the more definite supervision of all agricultural interests, and for a more direct inspection of cattle and of dairies. The appropriations of 1908 included increased provision for the conservation of agricultural, forest, and dairy interests, for the care of game, for education and public health, and for the investigation of the water resources of the State. Special attention was given to amendments of the law which aim to safeguard forests from fire and game from extinction, and to prevent the loss or misuse of water for domestic, power, and transportation purposes. This, however, was not an accident of recent agitation, but more particularly an evolution; and it operates, so far as Vermont is concerned, in a true appreciation, use, and care-taking of its local resources.

There has been special consideration given of late to public health, and laws were enacted governing the inspection of animals, supervising control of contagious and infectious diseases, suppressing adulterations of foods and drugs, advancing the working plans of the State laboratory of hygiene, more closely regulating the practice of medicine and surgery, forcing more specific duties on health officers everywhere, defining the practice of optometry--in short, all the means by which a State government may advance the well-being of its citizens through the application of what has been made known in science touching all these questions.

The State also advanced the well-being of its people by conserving their natural resources, material or acquired, through the creation of a Public Utility Commission, whose work has since demonstrated the need and value of its existence by its influence in behalf of the public of their use and service. We hold here that one of the most effective Conservation measures is that which gives the people the best service at the lowest cost of all the applications of natural resources, as interpreted by science, which nature bestows in the way of power, water, light, and drainage. We wish to state positively, however, that these problems cannot be treated as accidents of public experience, but as subjects of legislation and public treatment which define themselves in their true relationship to property rights and individual rights and to public necessity by the process of evolution.

This is illustrated by the way in which forestry conservation was instituted in Vermont many years back, when a few men of foresight took an interest in the subject, formed a society, and kept bringing attention to the subject until it was made a part of the law and in equal standing with agriculture in this State, and is now apparently an assured State subject of continued standing as much as other subjects of legislation, like education, public health, the preservation of game, and the administration of justice.

The expansion of the granite and marble industries of Vermont has been so great as to give it rank among the foremost producing States of the Union, and in the art and quality of its material and work it is foremost in all respects.

In self-government, as affects all the things which make living conditions naturally satisfactory and profitable, there has been marked increase in the conservation of all the living opportunities afforded by the State; but it is again emphasized that this has been in due course of growth and not the incidental recognition of a possibility. Our people have been conservative, rational, and human in the development of their chance, their natural resources, and their duty in regard to these, and have not required either through neglect or by any lapse of their rights the service of the National Government in this regard, least of all through any material modification of the relationship defining State rights and State duties. There is a greater disposition here to accept direction as concerns the husbandry of our resources from science than from politics, and to insist that the care and supervision of such matters will best conserve our interests and our happiness if left to the judgment, regulation, and control of our own folks.