Chapter XXX: Act 333: provided for conservation of natural gas and oil by preventing (8)

When the Missouri Valley River Improvement Association was organized in August, 1906, practically no one in the valley thought the Missouri navigable in its then unimproved state, and only a few people believed it worth while to solicit Government aid in trying to make it navigable. The general impression seemed to be that the Missouri had outlived its usefulness. Compare this feeling with the sentiment that exists today! The people of Kansas City and the entire Missouri Valley have become awakened to the great possibilities of this river as a means of cheap transportation. Through the efforts of our Association and the people of the valley, the Congress of the United States in 1907 made an appropriation of $400,000 for the improvement of the Missouri; in 1909 Congress made another appropriation of $555,000, and in June, 1910, still another of $1,465,000 for improving the river from its mouth to Fort Benton.

So great is the interest in the Missouri river project that the people of Kansas City recently raised a fund of over $1,000,000 for the purpose of navigating the Missouri with modern and up-to-date boats especially adapted to this river. Experiments are now being made with different kinds of boats to determine which are the most practical. With the opening of navigation in the spring of 1911, we hope to have a modern boat line in operation between Kansas City and Saint Louis. In addition to raising $1,000,000 for navigating the Missouri, Kansas City at her bond election in the spring of this year, voted $75,000 bonds for the improvement of her harbor.

The sentiment in favor of improving and navigating the Missouri was brought about to a great extent by some of the business men of Kansas City who in 1906 organized a boat-line company to maintain regular steamboat service between Kansas City and Saint Louis to demonstrate that the river was navigable even in its then unimproved state. This company, not waiting to build boats suited to the river, bought two old boats, and in 1907 and 1908 operated them with great success, carrying freight between Kansas City and Saint Louis at two-thirds of the railroad rates. When the people of Kansas City saw what could be done with the antiquated type of boat, they became interested in navigating the river with first-class steel-hull boats, built especially for the Missouri--which resulted in the organization of the Million Dollar Boat Line.

A movement is now under way to organize a company for the purpose of building a large dam across one of Missouri's streams within 120 miles of Kansas City. It is proposed to put up a plant that will generate 30,000 horsepower; this to be transmitted to Kansas City and sold to the consumers at the low price of one cent per kilowatt-hour. The largest consumers of electric power in Kansas City are now paying 2-1/2 cents and the smaller consumers from 8 to 10 cents per kilowatt-hour. The proposition has the appearance of being feasible, and if it can be carried through it means a great deal to the future growth of the Missouri Valley, as it will furnish cheap power to prospective manufactories.

Respectfully submitted,
[Signed] JEROME TWICHELL
_Chairman_

REPORT OF THE UPPER MISSISSIPPI RIVER IMPROVEMENT ASSOCIATION

How to conserve the natural resources of every land has become an absorbing theme throughout the civilized world, and I think no one is more alert in reference thereto than the inhabitants of the former Northwest Territory and of the Louisiana Purchase. They are of the salt of the earth; yet notwithstanding their power they have permitted constant encroachments by predatory greed and covetousness, mostly by the corporate monopoly rampant world-wide in this Twentieth Century. It is thus fitting that this magnificent assembly of progressive public-spirited Delegates from nearly every avocation and locality should here gather at the head of navigation of the great flowing stream that drains the most fertile valley on this mundane sphere. Viewing these fertile lands, it would be most natural to expect that the rights of this people declared by the law of Congress enacted in 1787 should be deemed wise, especially this provision:

_Article IV._ The navigable waters leading into the Mississippi
and Saint Lawrence, and the carrying places between the same,
shall be common highways and forever free as well to the
inhabitants of the said Territory as to the citizens of the
United States and those of any other States that may be
admitted into the Confederacy, without any tax impost or duty
therefor.

The Association that I represent has labored during the past decade to so awaken public sentiment in this valley that a six-foot channel will be provided from here to the Gulf; and I bring the message to you that we have aided much in arousing the people from lethargy to a forceful activity for cheaper transportation by inland waterway improvement, which has been assured to this upper river within the succeeding dozen years by Congressional action at the last session.

The problem to be grappled with now is how best to regain for the public the landings for boats, which we find have been obtained and are largely held by private interests antagonistic to thorough use of the stream. Generally for a mere pittance the landing rights, to the thread of the stream, passed to private ownership needlessly and without any consideration to the original grantor, the Government. Each city and village along the river is now up and doing, as is this city of Saint Paul in providing a municipal wharf at enormous expense; they are now fully apprised of the importance of these holdings, which we ardently hope will be regained for free public use, so that improved machinery for loading and unloading cargoes of modern boats and barges by a single power lift may become effective, as may be seen along the Rhine. When this is done, boats will again ply this great river and its tributaries, carrying the abundant products of every kind that this valley annually produces at a much cheaper rate than by rail.

We, who people this Central Northwest, were pioneers in opposing rapacious transportation rates; it was the Granger movement hereabouts, nearly forty years since, that aroused the law-making powers to the necessity of conferring on State and Federal commissions the power to regulate rates; and further results are yet to be hoped for in the regulation of charges for freight, passenger, express, sleeping-car, and mail service, together with telegraph and telephone charges. This valley between the Alleghany and Rocky Mountains was ordained by nature to supply foodstuffs for a goodly portion of the globe's people; and with the opening of the Panama Canal, along with the development of our inland waterway transportation, the problem of traffic rates must be solved.

While the general Government has been using the people's money to improve rivers and build canals, no sooner does the Government undertake to develop power incidental to some praiseworthy project than it finds that the water-power was absorbed by private interests, which were at all times alert to obtain grants in perpetuity (now worth millions) without any regulation to redound to the people's good--as shown by the reports of our waterway conventions. The best sites are already taken away from the people; shall we bend every energy to save what remains? This should be all changed in future grants of power-rights in flowing water; a census of the Nation's water-power resources should be taken, and all grants hereafter should be determined, with the respective values of the same, for use at equitable rates. When once the law-makers realize that the people are truly in earnest about Conservation, a halt will be called upon reckless legislation in the interest of exploiters; then sincere citizens may be induced to stand as legislative candidates, without fear of being pilloried by a subsidized press and venal poll-workers at every turn in a canvass.

Our waterway improvement conventions in this valley have spoken plainly, and the rivers and harbors are faring better than ever before--in fact, our efforts along these lines have done wonders to bring to the people, by acts of Congress, what is justly their own. Will the Conservationists array themselves against all law-makers who have proven recreant by their attitude toward clean-cut legislation in aid of Conservation throughout the United States? Smooth words, without conscientious acts in the interests of our lofty aims, should meet with a lasting rebuke! "Fight it out on this line if it takes several summers," should be our slogan.

[Signed] M. J. MCENIRY
_Chairman Conservation Committee_

REPORT OF THE WASHINGTON STATE FEDERATION OF LABOR

The Washington State Federation of Labor will not be represented by any of the Washington State Delegates at the Second National Conservation Congress. We are, however, deeply interested in the question of conservation of natural resources for the people, and as President of this organization, with a membership of over 20,000, I believe I am expressing the sentiment of the workingmen of this State when I say that I am in entire accord with the declaration of views and recommendations of the Governors of States and Territories of the United States, as adopted at the Conference of Governors, called by President Roosevelt, in May, 1908.

Our vast forests, our water supply (for irrigation and power projects), and our fisheries are of inestimable value to the people if properly developed under a control that will make the very best use of them with due regard to their future possibilities and greatness. Forestry, irrigation, and water power are to a great extent dependent on one another in their successful development, and the magnitude of the undertaking requires the hearty cooperation of State and Nation if it reaches the degree of success that we hope for.

I trust that the Congress will strengthen and perfect plans adequate for the protection of the people's interests and the development of these resources with an eye to their future greatness.

Respectfully submitted,
[Signed] CHAS. R. CASE
_President_

REPORT OF THE WESTERN FORESTRY AND CONSERVATION ASSOCIATION

Let us concede that Conservation means that we, as a people, should manage all our resources with the intelligence and prudence that an individual should devote to managing his own property. Let us use them profitably, as he would; neither destroying or wasting them unnecessarily, nor giving them heedlessly to anyone who needs them less and will use them less to our advantage. But let us not, during excursions into Constitutional problems, State rights, and other bewildering issues, forget that first of all comes protection from destruction and waste! The great danger now is that our resources will disappear while we are deciding to whom they shall belong.

It is of this kind of Conservation alone, the Conservation that conserves, that I bring you a message from the Pacific Northwest. The Western Forestry and Conservation Association does not decry the necessity for wise action by State and Nation in the safeguarding of water-power, minerals, and lands; but the settlement of such affairs is not our function. I come only to tell you of the work of the most perfectly organized and successful Conservation movement ever undertaken by private individuals in this country--the forest-protective associations of the Pacific slope. We talk little, but we work, spend money, and accomplish.

In our five States from Montana to California stands half the merchantable timber in the United States, the majority in private hands. The control of this stupendous community resource entails grave responsibilities. To preserve it for the fullest use, to replace it when used, if possible--this is the timber-owner's duty. His ownership is largely a public trust. Nowhere else has he realized this so promptly and acted so adequately as in the Pacific Northwest. I have come to report his stewardship, and to show you that you need not wonder whether he will follow the Conservation banner.

The Western Forestry and Conservation Association has no individual membership. It is the central medium or clearing house for a dozen subsidiary associations of timber-land owners, representing millions of acres, who cooperate in order to apply to the best advantage the most modern and efficient systems of forest protection. Through this means they employ a trained forester to assist them in solving problems of reforestation, forest legislation, education, and like matters demanding expert knowledge or central facilities. Its meetings are attended not only by delegates from these timber-owners' organizations, but also by the leading State and Forest Service officials and representatives of the public Conservation associations. All work in the closest harmony to devise and execute practical and effective policies. There are no dissensions at these meetings; no question as to who is most competent by right of law or geography. Every man there, be he a humble officer of the Forest Service, State Forester, or timber owner, is there because he wants to do his own part, with his own hands or money, in preserving the magnificent forests of the West. He knows what he is talking about, and the rest are mighty glad to hear him.

But we do not stop with meetings, and herein is perhaps our chief difference from a great many advocates of Conservation. You have all read of the recent fires in our northwestern country. They have been greatly exaggerated, the area injured really being very limited. Nevertheless, while we talk here of generalities, bands of weary, half-blind men are still battling to prevent fresh outbreaks; the smoke still curls over the blackened forms of those who met a fearful death to save the lives of others; scores who fought till they could fight no more still lie bandaged and sightless in the extremity of mortal agony. No honor is too great to do these heroes. We of the West owe a sacred debt to them, one and all, and not least to the men of the Forest Service whose training made them as efficient as they were brave. We want more, not fewer, of them. But side by side with the bravest, equally efficient, equally trained and disciplined, worked the patrolmen of our fire associations. Conservationists employed by private effort. We have had no time to prepare nice statistics, for our fire fighters have something else to do; but I venture to say that our Associations' expenditures for forest protection this year will be over $300,000. In the Coeur d' Alene fires alone, a single one of our Associations put 850 men in the field.

And yet this is not much to boast of. There should have been no fires to fight. The way to prevent fire is to prevent it, not fight it when almost or quite beyond control. The only solution of the fire question is better enforcement of better laws, better public sentiment, and better patrol. There must be an organized force of trained and vigilant men, ample in numbers during the dry season to reach all fires in their incipiency. It is in this that our Associations now lead all other agencies. They handle the fire situation in a much better and more comprehensive manner than even the Government has ever done, because they spend three times as much money per acre for patrol. Thoroughly excellent as are the methods in the National Forests--they are identical with those of the most progressive practical timberman--Congress does not sustain them adequately.

Our own system is by no means perfect yet. Although in the territory covered by our Association in Idaho, Washington, and Oregon we have perhaps 500 organized and equipped patrolmen, each authorized to hire help when needed, there is still much unorganized area, and not all timbermen within our territory contribute as they should. We need more men and more money from our own brethren, and heartier cooperation from public, State, and Government. But we confidently expect to get all this, just as we have in greater measure each year in the past. And when, as already in Washington last year, one Association protects 8,000,000 acres with a loss of but 1,000 acres; when this small loss was caused by less than 6 fires out of 1,200 extinguished; when in this historic year of 1910 we have controlled our countless fires so that actual disasters can be counted on the fingers, and our loss as a whole is insignificant--we feel that no one has done more to prove his willingness and competence to practice Conservation that counts than the northwestern forest owner.

The northwestern timberman approves all measures that will give the greatest number of people the greatest permanent opportunity to profit by the fullest use and least waste of all our resources. Thus they will be most prosperous and use most lumber. He is doing more than anyone else, Government or State, to protect both old and growing forests from wasteful destruction, so there may be most lumber to use. I take it this is Conservation.

[Signed] E. T. ALLEN
_Forester_

REPORT OF THE UNITED MINE WORKERS

I regret very much that serious complications in the mining industry of our country, together with an enormous amount of important matters requiring my immediate attention, makes it impossible for me to keep my engagement to address the Conservation Congress on the subject, "Are we mining intelligently?" I am intensely interested in the subject of conserving our natural resources, but I am still more interested in protecting the lives and health of our people. We are not mining intelligently, as I will explain by letter.

Success to the work of the Conservation Congress! It means much for the future generations of this greatest industrial country on earth.

[Signed] T. L. LEWIS
_President_

TIMBER CONSERVATION

GEORGE H. EMERSON

_Hoquiam, Washington_

To save our Nation's resources is the wish of all; to save our timber is the special wish of all timber owners--no one is so much interested as he who has his private gain or loss joined to his interest in the public good.

The American people are a prodigal folk. They have looked upon their resources as inexhaustible, their lands as unlimited. They have called upon all nations to come, and to all comers they have given lands, mines, timber, water-power. Has this course been right? Up to a point in our development, yes; of late, no--most emphatically NO! These resources are entrusted to us as a heritage for our children and generations yet to come. "America for Americans" should have been sounded 25 years ago; had it been, there would today be no cry of approaching timber shortage.

What more absurd disposition of our timber land could have been made than the laws under which it has passed to private hands? The Homestead and Preemption acts, framed for prairies, requiring the settler to live on and cultivate the soil, have been extended to our forests, and to comply with their terms, thousands of men have withdrawn from vocations by which they were increasing the wealth of the Nation, and with blankets and provisions strapped on their backs and axe and compass in hand have worked their weary way through the pathless forests to vacant Government lands, on which they filed. Then with axe and fire they spent months destroying the property they proposed to acquire title to--destroying the resources of the Nation instead of increasing its wealth; and in doing so, fires reached beyond their control and destroyed still other timber. The law and the ruling of the Land Office have made this destruction one of the considerations of acquiring title. Settlers must prove they "have cleared and planted and maintained a residence on the land;" that is, they must prove they have cut and burned a certain amount of the Nation's timber, and have wasted or--worse--employed in destruction certain of the Nation's time, and this to acquire title to land upon which they could no more live than in the middle of a desert! Lands whose only value was in timber they were compelled, in part, to destroy; and this where they never intended to settle, other than to comply with the letter of the law, and never expected to return after acquiring title. The months or years wasted in complying with these foolish laws they might better by far have been spent in jail at the public expense. It would have cost the Nation far less, and would have been less dangerous to life than the lonely existence remote from other human beings, where any accident to limb costs a life.

Sometimes there was an actual settler who wanted a farm or a pasture. He considered the timber only in the light of its cost to remove, and with axe, saw, and fire, he proceeded to its destruction. And why not? That which cost nothing looked to be of no value! Timber appeared as free as air and sunshine.

Later the lumberman came, and up to 1885 our Government offered him in Washington hundreds of thousands of acres of the best-timbered land for $1.25 per acre. Michigan and Wisconsin had been so offered, and mostly sold. The lands of the Northern Pacific could then be had at $2.50 per acre and paid for in the bonds of the Company, then worth half their face. The lumbermen looked upon the timber as inexhaustible. Only that near water could be harvested by known methods; only the best of the trees could be sawed and sold at a profit; only western markets appeared possible. What wonder fires were set to burn the choppings and make pastures? No people save that which cost nothing, and for which they have no use and cannot sell. When things become of value they are conserved, and when of enough value they are manufactured or grown; and the ratio between cost and selling price regulates the supply of things manufactured or grown.

Up to within a few years there has been plenty of timber land that could be taken under the Homestead, Preemption, or Timber and Stone Acts, or scripted or bought of the railroads. The blame, then, for the waste of our timber has been with the laws that made it valueless. The men we have sent to Washington to make our laws have given this timber to all comers of all nations. They are the men our people should hold responsible for the waste of our resources. These same men now tell us, "We are on the verge of a timber famine," and that the lumbermen are wantonly wasting the Nation's timber. Is it not the old cry of "Stop thief!" sounded by the culprit? By their acts they have made this timber valueless. Had the Government estimated the cost of growing a timber crop and sold its timber at about that price, timber would have been protected, conserved, and replanted, and its use would be as in Europe, about 60 feet per capita per annum, instead of 600 feet as in America.

Since our timber has taken on a value, its destruction by fire has greatly decreased. Timber owners now use precautions, and employ fire patrols. So, too, with harvesting; it is cut cleaner, sawed with thinner saws, manufactured with better appliances, and great saving has been effected in every branch of the industry--all because of greater values. Now, if just tax laws were passed, taxing no crop until harvested, and taxing reforested land as stump land; if rates of interest were lower, and if stringent fire laws and careful patrol were enforced; if stumpage was a little higher or labor a little lower, or the railroads were to make a reduced rate on low-grade products, the law of supply and demand (or the ratio of cost to selling price) would reforest old choppings. Toward these things we are rapidly advancing, and before our timber is exhausted we shall have reached this point.

If our Government would hold her reserved timber at cost of reproduction, and protect the timber of the Nation by import duty, the question of timber shortage in America would soon be settled. Instead, they threaten reduction of its present value and increase of its waste by the removal of duty on imports. There is no way to conserve any commodity but to give it value, and no way to make people manufacture goods or grow crops except to offer a price that covers cost and a profit.

If the public would buy lumber of strength and durability suited to the purposes required, instead of ordering grades better than needed, they would help the Conservation of our timber far more than by essays and speeches. The most unreasonable of all buyers are our Government officials; with them there seems to be no purpose for which ordinary lumber is suited. So, too, if our State legislators would pass just tax laws, they would make a grand move toward timber Conservation. Instead, counties are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars--which the timber owners must pay--estimating the number of feet of standing timber, so as to be sure they find it all and tax it out of existence. This generation owes posterity laws that will save some of our present timber and leave to them growing timber crops instead of charred and desolate stump lands telling only of their fathers' greed and lack of foresight.

Wonderful tables have been prepared showing the upward tendency in prices of timber lands. Far better prepare a table showing the cost of growing a timber crop, and causes that have deprived it of its legitimate value. Water always rises to its level when the pressure is removed. Timber-value level is costly to produce. The greatest pressure to hold timber values down in the past have been our land laws; first the Federal laws for the sale of timber, second the State laws for taxes--and lack of all laws for protection and planting.

Our Nation is still a prodigal. She taps the fuel supply of future generations and allows the gas to burn and the oil to run to waste. More of the timber of the Nation has been burned for clearing and pasture than has been sawed by the mills; but when the lumbermen are accused of destroying their property, or not utilizing all that will return cost for their labor, they are accused of lack of good intelligence--and that we resent. New England and New York have a greater area in timber than they had 50 years ago. Nearly every town site has a saw mill that supplies local demand and makes shipments to nearby cities. The few days I spent in New Hampshire last spring, and the auto trips I took through the places I knew in my youth, impressed these facts with force. Rail trips through Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Maryland revealed the fact that thousands of acres once under cultivation are now in timber, and that old forest lands are reproducing. Pine groves, cut when I was a boy, are being harvested, and fields where I picked rocks every spring are growing beautiful pine forests; the present owner of the old homestead in New Hampshire has put in a little saw and shingle mill to cut trees that were not sprouted when I left the old farm. The small saw-mills that are supplying the local demand are cutting the largest of the new growth, and the supply of that portion of the States where the timber was once exhausted will hereafter be adequate to local demands. As it is in New England and the Middle States, so it is in the South, in the West, in California and Oregon and Washington; if we keep out the fires in the old choppings, the new growth will be ready before the old is gone--and the waste of today kept always damp by the young growth, brush, ferns, and vines, will rival in value the portion of the tree we are now able to market.

Again consumption in all things is in proportion to price. Advance the price of lumber, and you reduce the consumption. Stone, brick, concrete, and steel are ready substitutes, as the price of lumber advances. In Europe, lumber is no longer a necessity, only a luxury, and not one much cared for at that; this has been forced home to me in countries I have visited during the past six months. Six days from New York we touch the Azores, a land where no lumber is used except for floor-joists and rafters in the cheaper buildings; next we touched Madeira, and found a city of stone. So with Gibraltar, southern Spain, Egypt, Syria, Greece, Italy, France; not a lumber yard in all these countries that we could find. A cargo a year would supply the demand for all purposes. The wonder was not how these people get along without lumber, but how they use the 60 feet per annum they are reported to require. I do not think there is one shingle roof in all those countries, and I expect a very good knowledge of Arabic would be needed to explain to those people what a shingle is and its use. In Constantinople we found a few miserable board shacks. Lumber comes to that market at a low price from the Black Sea, and it appears to be a detriment rather than a good. In Switzerland and southern Germany, some houses are built of wood above the lower story; but I think there are no shingle roofs. These countries are well timbered, with trees in rows showing they are planted. The price of common lumber is only a little higher than with us, but labor is cheap, and growing timber exempt from taxes. Trees there can find a profitable market, trunks, limbs, stump, and roots. It is then, little wonder mountain sides, impossible for agriculture, should be planted to timber. Those timber areas do not use much of their lumber. In Switzerland and Germany we found saw mills, some of them of fair capacity, and shipping by rail, but their towns were built of stone. The mills select the largest trees, and replace with new plants. In time we shall reach some of these same conditions, and plant our timber instead of allowing it to grow at will. All this will come about when proper laws are enacted.

American people will some time awaken to the fact, long since known in Europe, that timber is no necessity; only a makeshift. Bridges of rock, houses of brick and stone and steel, with roofs of tile, are for the centuries; buildings of wood are only for the years and the flames. Lumber is cheap in the new countries, and convenient for quick shelter; and it is there forests are found. Big timbers may become scarce, but their demand is also decreasing. Already our cities have fire limits. Bridges and spars are of steel; and if our farmers could obtain money at city rates, it is doubtful if it would not be cheaper for them to build fire-proof houses than to pay higher insurance on wooden buildings. Already roofs of shingles are in balance with roofs of other and safer material, and the price of shingles is fixed by this competition. As it is with shingles it will be with lumber, and is for many purposes; in many countries for nearly all purposes.

Do not think I underestimate the value of our timber, or fail to advocate its protection and reproduction; but he who says we are approaching the time when timber values are to be much greater than now, and he who predicts a timber famine, have both overlooked facts that will come to the front with the years. The cry of "Fire!" never stopped a conflagration. The cry of Conservation will never stop the waste of valueless commodities. Action is needed in both instances, if results are to be attained. To conserve our timber we must give it value. Let the Government refuse to sell from its reserves except for cost of reproduction; also protect us from foreign competition. Educate our loggers to the enormity of the crime of burning choppings fit only for the timber crop. Let States impose rigid fire laws and make liberal appropriation for forest protection. Let our legislators see the folly and injustice of taxing the same crop year after year; a crop that can contribute nothing toward paying those taxes until marketed, a crop that is of far less value per acre than the yield of fruit gathered each year. Do not be afraid the few remaining timber owners are going to be benefited at the expense of the many; rather the benefit will be for our children and our children's children. Above all, remember the timber owner is not to blame, only fortunate that he bought timber that our Government was willing to part with for a song; and hold our laws and their makers responsible for results for which they, only, are to blame.

The forest fires of the West today are more often set by the railroads than by all others. Their locomotives are torches of demons, tearing through our forests, streaming fire from their stacks and leaving all behind in flames. From the rear platforms of trains I have seen hundreds of little fires spring up as we passed--this, when the woods were dry and conditions right. The timber they burn is their resources for freight. The destruction they create is a loss of millions to their own business. It would seem prosecution for damage done should follow their wanton torches, and that laws should be made for the protection of their own interests they so recklessly ignore. It is no longer the logger or the settler that causes our forest fires. Our laws and public opinion, and vast sums expended by timber owners prevent the setting of careless fires; but the railroad locomotives still scatter fire along their pathway through the woods. Let the railroads learn a lesson from the recent Montana fires that stretched along their lines on either side and crossed the rivers where they cross--fires that have destroyed millions of young pines that a few years hence would have yielded a freight of from $10 to $30 each tree for their transportation to market.

Let the loggers awaken to the fatal folly of allowing the first fire in their cuttings, and our legislators to the necessity of forest protection. Stop the first fire where land is only adopted to the timber crop.

Out in the West where our mountains are the highest; where our streams spring from the eternal glaciers and are fullest when the weather is warmest; where water falls the farthest; where our soils are most productive when moistened; where our fruit is the finest; where trees grow the largest; where our hills contain coal, iron, silver, copper, and gold; where our ocean is the greatest and our fisheries are most prolific, our people are all Conservationists. They are for Conservation that is practical and adapted to their peculiar conditions; Conservation that shall develop and utilize their resources, and that shall yield the greatest good to the greatest number, and to the future as well as the present.

Where all things are on so grand a scale, the people cannot be small and narrow. They are as are their woods, their mountains, and their torrents, grand and active; and they are to be trusted. They will solve the problem of conserving their timber. They will keep out fires. They will enact just tax laws. They will guard their holdings. They will encourage new growth. They will be first to awaken to the best methods of forest Conservation adapted to their needs. They will solve the problem of conserving our western forests.

FORESTS AND STREAM-FLOW

WILLIAM S. HARVEY

_Philadelphia_

Professor Willis L. Moore, Chief of the United States Weather Bureau, in his address before the Atlantic Deeper Waterways Convention in Providence, September 1, 1910, made the statement that the waterways were in no way affected by the forests; that he had records made for many years that clearly prove that the waterways have in no way been affected by the acts of man; that he was aware that he would destroy a popular impression by making this statement, and that he based his statement upon the facts as he knew them. The following eminent men in articles published in _American Forestry Magazine_ for April, 1910, take exception to and refute the statements and claims made by Professor Moore (and which he had previously expressed): Professor Filibert Roth, University of Michigan, Forester; Professor L. C. Glenn, Vanderbilt University, Geologist; and Professor George F. Swain, Harvard University, Engineer. These gentlemen represent geology, forestry, and engineering, and their training, knowledge, and experience qualify them to speak intelligently and with authority on this question of the influence and effect forests have upon streams.

Mill owners and operators on various rivers in New England have practical demonstration that denuding or partial denuding of the forests on the head-waters of the stream on which they are dependent for power has seriously impaired the uniformity of flow and lessened the amount of power which they are able to secure for the same number of days in a year: that denuding also allows the rainfall to run off rapidly, causing erosion, which erosion is filling and choking the streams and rivers and in seasons of flood depositing silt in valleys which have heretofore been of agricultural value, thus largely impairing or destroying their fertility. This condition equally applies to various streams and rivers in other sections of the United States. It is moreover denied and refuted by the greatest financial and manufacturing interests, who have spent and are spending hundreds of millions of dollars in the development of electric power on the waterways of the United States. They have in their employ the most competent engineers known, who have investigated the entire situation, studied the maximum and minimum rainfall for a long period of years, and conditions influencing the territory embraced on the streams and rivers upon which they propose to make and are making and have made developments. These great interests, vital to commerce and trade, emphatically state that the flow of streams is affected by the forest cover, and that they are most anxious and are earnest in efforts to have the forest cover protected in all territory in which they operate, claiming that if the hillsides or mountains on the headwaters of water-sheds are denuded the volume of power will be so diminished, impaired, or destroyed that the value of the bonds issued for the development of these powers, and heretofore considered one of the safest and most desirable investments, will be seriously imperilled.

In addition to the authorities above named, and to whose articles I have referred, there are others who have refuted and contradicted Professor Moore from his own premises and data. His Excellency M J. J. Jusserand, Ambassador from France, publicly stated the absolute principle: "No forests, no waterways." Without forests regulating the distribution of water, rainfalls are at once carried to the sea, hurried sometimes, alas! across the country. After having devastated the neighboring fields, the rivers find themselves again with little water and much sand; and with such rivers, how will you fill your canals?

The question is as clear as can be; do you want to have navigable rivers, or do you prefer to have torrents that will destroy your crops and never bear a boat? If you prefer the first, then mind your forests. If the Mississippi is the "Father of Waters," the forest is the father of the Mississippi. The French Ambassador, you will note, says, "We can tell you, for we know. France is now spending many millions of dollars to reforest the mountain-sides denuded many years ago, which have seriously affected her waterways."

Some of us feel it is unwise to take too seriously all the deductions and predictions that are made by academic, scientific, idealistic theorists, especially if the department of science with which they are most intimately identified relates almost exclusively to atmospheric conditions, which are still so imperfectly understood that they not infrequently elude prediction; though where the results of scientific deductions are proven correct and add to the fund of knowledge, they are deserving of our greatest respect and regard. We have much confidence, for example, in the conclusion of Gifford Pinchot and his staff of assistants, who have made a practical as well as scientific study of the effect of forest cover on the flow and supply of water in streams, which conclusions unqualifiedly refute the statements made by Professor Moore.

THE CONSERVATION OF MINERALS AND SUBTERRANEAN WATERS

GEORGE FREDERICK KUNZ, PH.D.

_New York_

The necessity for conserving the forests has been fully recognized, and it may be said that as to what is in the ground a clear and satisfactory distinction has been established between what must be conserved for the good of the people as a whole, and what can safely be left to the exclusive control, management, and ownership of individuals or corporations. In regard, however, to the material wealth that lies beneath the ground, whether diamonds, gold, silver, copper, oil, or clay, or, indeed, anything that has a material value and can be included as such in the domain of mining statistics, there has been and still is a considerable difference of opinion touching what should be done.

The existence of these materials beneath the ground is not usually evident, and the judgment of the best experts is frequently required to determine whether they exist in a given tract or not; on the other hand they may sometimes be casually found where their presence was not suspected. The Government of the United States still owns great tracts of land, and it is most important that the whole people of the United States should receive the full benefit of all the mineral wealth that is below the ground--the invisible wealth of the Nation, as it may be termed.

In order to avoid any collusion on the part of officials engaged by the Government to make investigations, or of those who, though no longer in the Government service, might learn the results of these investigations and might in some manner try to obtain control of these lands before the Government knew they had a distinct value, it would seem that a Conservation Act should be passed making it imperative that all minerals contained in any land beneath the surface should forever remain the property of the Government. With lands containing minerals, there should further be an assurance that the deposits will be effectively worked, thus preventing an entire mineral supply from being locked up for many years, so as to maintain an artificial value for the material. Again, little-understood minerals, or those that have been very little worked and yet may have a value in the future, such as bauxite, which is valuable in the manufacture of aluminum; monazite sand, which is used in the making of the Welsbach incandescent light; and carnotite, whose value as a radium ore has been discovered within the past ten years--should all be made to yield royalties to the Government.

It is very evident that many minerals not considered to have any commercial value today may prove to be of the greatest industrial value in the future. Furthermore, as we are likely to discover new elements, and new uses for old minerals, the Conservation Act might be made to provide for a payment of 20, 30, or even 60 percent of the total value of the mineral as taken from the ground in royalty to the Government of the United States, exactly as the South African Government exacts as a royalty 60 percent of the product of all the diamond mines within its territory. This would be a more generous treatment of private owners than was accorded them in some instances in the past. The French crown-deeds read in the Seventeenth Century that gold, silver, lapis-lazuli, etc, should belong exclusively to the crown. In reality, the Government should only sell to private owners what is in sight on the land and the right to what could be grown on it, not what is below the ground. The franchises of subways and tunnels and all mineral rights should be retained, as well as the right to condemn at a fair valuation any property needed for the development of a mine or a water-power.

The term "mineral" should apply to every substance found in the ground that is either a mineral or an associate of minerals, that is, rock, sand, clay, or even a swamp, that may have a value in the arts, sciences, agriculture, or any other monetary value. The word should be used in its broad sense and not in the more restricted scientific meaning of the word used by mineralogists, which is that a mineral must be a definite mineral compound.

The subterranean waters of the United States are a great and valuable asset of the Nation. Nearly all of our water companies sell water either for power or for consumption. As each owner of a piece of property ought to be entitled to an interest in the water under it, some provision in Conservation should be made for the actual ownership of the waters; not that they can be drained from under the property, for a series of springs could be threatened with ruin if this were done, just as were the famous springs in Saratoga. In other words Government lands should not be robbed of their subterranean waters to be in turn sold to those who have a joint right in them.

THE QUESTION OF LAND TITLES

FRANKLIN MCCRAY

_Indianapolis_

All the territory west of Mississippi river was acquired by the Government by three means, purchase, conquest, and treaty. This territory, having been obtained by the diplomacy and blood and treasure of our common country, belonged to the people of the whole country, and was held in trust by the Federal Government for them. It was subject only to their call for settlement.

The charge is made that practically all the looting of the public domain is in the Louisiana purchase, the territory wrested from Mexico, that acquired from Great Britain by the Ashburton-Webster treaty in the settlement of our northern boundary line, and that purchased from Russia. This land, being held in trust by the Federal Government for the people and being subject only to their call for actual settlement, it is charged, has been plundered through fraud and corruption of the trustee, the Government of the United States, in collusion with the grantees, who have obtained vast tracts and withdrawn the same from settlement by floating them into a different channel than that for which the Government held them in trust. By this corrupt and fraudulent method, it is charged that these vast estates have been monopolized by corporate greed and accumulated wealth, and that no less than 6,000,000 acres are now being held by two individuals alone within the State of California.

If this be true, then, under a well-settled principle of law, the Government has conferred no title upon such grantees, because fraud vitiates all contracts, and courts of equity have complete power under proper proceedings to follow this property, thus fraudulently obtained, in its labyrinthian processes and seize it by judicial decree, lay its stern hand upon it and restore it to its rightful owners, the people of the United States, and float it anew into the channel of settlement where it rested prior to its spoliation. I suggest that this Congress petition the United States Congress to investigate the titles of these grantees and, if found to be fraudulent, the Department of Justice should be instructed to institute proceedings calculated to restore the land to its rightful owners.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The full report by Mrs Wilkinson appears on later pages.

[2] The members of the Resolution Committee were chosen by their respective State Delegations, and met at the call of a Temporary Chairman (and member-at-large), Ex-Governor George C. Pardee, of California, who was afterward chosen by the committee as Permanent Chairman. The full personnel of the committee follows:

ALABAMA, John L. Kaul, Birmingham
ARIZONA, B. A. Fowler, Phenix
ARKANSAS, John A. Fox, Blytheville
CALIFORNIA, Frank H. Short, Fresno
COLORADO, P. T. Coolidge, Colorado Spgs.
COLUMBIA (District of), W J McGee, Washington
CONNECTICUT, A. Fletcher Marsh, New Haven
FLORIDA, Cromwell Gibbons, Jacksonville
GEORGIA, C. L. Worsham, Atlanta
IDAHO, Jerome J. Day, Moscow
ILLINOIS, Alfred L. Baker, Chicago
INDIANA, William Holton Dye, Indianapolis
IOWA, Robert Hunter, Sioux City
KANSAS, Governor William R. Stubbs, Lawrence
KENTUCKY, C. C. Grassham, Paducah
LOUISIANA, Robert Roberts, Jr., Minden
MAINE, Cyrus C. Babb, Augusta
MARYLAND, Lynn R. Meekins, Baltimore
MASSACHUSETTS, C. A. Start, Boston
MICHIGAN, Francis King, Alma
MINNESOTA, E. W. Robinson, Minneapolis
MISSISSIPPI, H. L. Whitfield, Columbus
MISSOURI, George B. Logan, Saint Louis
MONTANA, F. L. Newman, Havre
Rudolph Van Tolbel, Lewistown
NEBRASKA, Woodruff Ball, Valentine
NEW HAMPSHIRE, Geo. B. Leighton
NEW JERSEY, Frederick W. Kelsey, Orange
NEW MEXICO, W. A. Fleming Jones, Las Cruces
NEW YORK, J. S. Whipple, Salamanca
NORTH DAKOTA, James E. Boyle, Grand Forks
OHIO, Charles Lathrop Pack, Cleveland
OKLAHOMA, Benjamin Martin, Jr., Muskogee
OREGON, M. A. Moody, The Dalles
PENNSYLVANIA, M. I. McCreight, Dubois
RHODE ISLAND, H. A. Barker, Providence
SOUTH CAROLINA, E. W. Durant, Jr., Charleston
SOUTH DAKOTA, P. H. O'Neill, Faulkton
TEXAS, S. H. Cowan, Fort Worth
UTAH, Harden Bennion, Salt Lake City
VERMONT, George Aitkin, Woodstock
WASHINGTON, George H. Emerson, Hoquiam
WEST VIRGINIA, I. C. White, Morgantown
WISCONSIN, William Irvine, Chippewa Falls
WYOMING, E. H. Fourt, Lander

[3] The corrected list appears elsewhere (page iv).

[4] The reports submitted by States as mentioned in the responses to the Call of States are printed in the Supplementary Proceedings, beginning on page 327, and are entered in the Contents and Index of the volume.

[5] The formal report for Ohio appears in the Supplementary Proceedings.

[6] In the opinion he held that the plaintiff was entitled to judgment, declaring the Brooklyn Cooperage Company and Cornell University contract void, and directed the University to convey to the State of New York the 30,000 acres constituting the College Forest.

[7] The relative prices of forest lands sixty years ago and now may be judged from the fact that in 1850 a Law (Chapter 250) was passed providing that the State should not sell public land on Raquette river for less than 15 cents an acre. The State is now paying over $7.00 an acre for the same kind of land.

[8] Declaration of Colonel David McClure in the Constitutional Convention of 1894.

INDEX

Agriculture in schools, 265
Work of the Department of, 194

AITKIN, GEORGE, Report by, 373

Alaska coal lands, 21, 310

ALLEN, E. T., Report by, 367, 424

American Academy of Political and Social Science, Report of, 379

American Automobile Association, Report of, 380

American Civic Association, Report of, 383

American Forestry Association, Report of, 384

American Humane Association, Report of, 385

American Institute of Architects, Report of, 386

American Medical Association, Report of, 389
Work of, 255

American Paper and Pulp Association, Report of, 388

American Railway Engineering and Maintenance of Way Association,
Report of, 392

American Railway Master Mechanics' Association, Report of, 393

American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society, Report of, 394

AMES, CHARLES W., Report by, 380

ANDERSON, A. T., Report by, 420

Arizona, Report from, 324

Arkansas, Report from, 314, 333

Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks, Report of, 397

Atlantic Deeper Waterways Association, Report of, 383

BABB, CYRUS C., Report by, 341

BABB, GEORGE W., Report by, 418

BABCOCK, GEORGE H., Report by, 411

BACKUS, E. W., Report by, 389

BAILEY, E. W. M., Report by, 411

BAILEY, LIBERTY HYDE, Address by, 203
Report by, 397

BAKER, A. L., Address by, 222

BAKER, BERNARD N., Introductory remarks by, 7
Report by, 314
Resolution of thanks to, 308

BALDWIN, A. S., Report by, 393

BALLINGER, R. A., Reference to work of, 76

BANNISTER, O. B., Report by, 314

BARKER, HENRY A., Report by, 324, 368, 384

BARRETT, JOHN, Address by, 80, 237

BARRETT, C. S., Report by, 411

BENSON, R. DALE, Report by, 418

BENTLEY, H. T., Report by, 394

BEVERIDGE, Senator ALBERT J., Address by, 146

BISSELL, R. M., Report by, 418

BLANCHARD, Ex-Governor NEWTON C., Address by, 121

BOARDMAN, Miss MABEL, Address by, 94

BROOKS, Governor BRYANT B., Address by, 72

BROWN, ELMER ELLSWORTH, Address by, 264
Letter from, 165

BROWN, J. ADAMS, Report by, 416

BRYCE, JAMES, Tribute to, 243

BURNHAM, AUSTIN A., Report by, 420

Business interest in Conservation, 222, 257

California, Resources of, 116

Call of States, Announcement of, 134, 171, 226, 298
Resumption of, 213, 299, 313

Capital, Relation of, to resources, 226

Carriage Builders' National Association, Report of, 410

CASE, CHARLES R., Report by, 423

CHAMPNEY, W. P., Report by, 411

Cities, Wastes of, 309

CLAPP, Senator MOSES E., Presiding Officer, 168

CLEVELAND, GROVER, quoted on monopoly, 224

Colorado, Report from, 334

Columbia (District of), Report from, 324

CONDRA, GEORGE E., Announcement by, 71
Explanation by, 298
Report by, 317

Conference of Governors, Reference to work of,
87, 225, 245, 247, 293, 379, 415

CONNOLLY, MAURICE, Report by, 411

Conservation
of Minerals and Subterranean Waters, 429
of the Nation's Resources, 328
Practical Aspects of, 331
Problems, Address on, 106
Program, The, 292

Constitution of the Congress, ix
Adoption of, 79

Country Life as related to Conservation, 203

CRAIGHEAD, EDWIN BOONE, Address by, 168

Credentials Committee, Appointment of, 79
Modification of, 106
Report of, 145

DAMON, A. W., Report by, 418

Daughters of the American Revolution, Work of, 270

DAVIDSON, JAMES H., Address by, 132

DAY, JEROME J., Report by, 336

DEAN, WILLIAM B., Report by 380

Delaware State Federation of Women's Clubs, Report of, 411

DENEEN, Governor CHARLES E., Address by, 59

Denmark, Successful agriculture of, 200