The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1907-06-10

other Is foresight. Unfortunately,
foresight is not usually characteristic
OF a young and vigorous people, and
IL is obviously not marked character
istic of US in the United States. Yet
assuredly it should be the growing
nation with future which takes the
long look ahead; and no other nation
Is growing so rapidly as ours or has
a future so full of promise. No other
nation enjoys so wonderful a measure
OF present prosperity which can of right
De treated Is an earnest of future sue
cess. and for no other are the rewards
OF foresight so great, so certain, and so
easily foretold. Yet hitherto as a ma
ton we have tended to live with an eye
single to the present, and have per-
united the reckless waste and destruc-
ton of much of our natural wealth.
The conservation of our natural re-
sources and their proper use consti-
tute the fundamental problem of our
national life. Unless we maintain an
adequate material basis for our civil
hzauon, we can not maintain the in
situations in which we take so great
and so just pride; and to waste and
destroy our natural resources means to
undermine this material basis. During
ing the last five years efforts have been
made in several new directions in the
government service to get our people
to look ahead, to exercise foresight.
and to substitute planned and order
" development of our resources in the
place of a haphazard striving for i'm
mediate profit. The effort has been
made through several agencies
In 1902 the Reclamation service be-
gan to develop the larger opportuni-
ties of the western half of our country
for irrigation. The work includes all
the states from the Great Plains
through the Rocky Mountains to the
Pacific slope. 1t has been conducted
with the clear and definite purpose of
using the valuable water resources of
the public land for the greatest good
for the greatest number in the long
run; in other words, for the purpose
of putting upon the land permanent
home makers who will use and devel-
op 1t for themselves and for their chill
dren and children's children. There
has been opposition, of course. to this
work of the Reclamation service; for
we have been obliged to antagonize
certain men whose interest it was. to
exhaust for their own temporary per-
sonal profit natural resources which
ought to be developed through use so
as to be conserved for the permanent
common advantage of the people as a
whole. But there will be no halt in the
work of preserving the waters which
head in the Rocky Mountain region so
people as whole; for the policy is es-
sential to our national welfare.
Public Land Laws.
The public lands of the United
similar
fashion. Our present public land laws
were passed when there was a vast
surplus of vacant public land. The
chief desire was to secure settlers
thereon, and comparatively slight at
tentton was paid as to exactly how the
lands were disposed of in detail. In
consequence, lax execution of the laws
became the rule both in the land Of
fee and in the public mind, and land
frauds were common and little noted.
This was especially true when a sys-
tenn originally designed for the fertile
and well-watered regions of the mid
die west was applied to the dryer re-
g1ons of the great plains and to the
mountains and the Pacific coast In
these regions the system lent itself to
fraud, and much land passed out of
the hands of the government without
passing into the hands of the home
maker. The department of the In
terror and the department of justice
Joined in prosecuting the offenders
against the law; but both the law and
its administration were defective and
needed to be changed. Three years
ago a public lands commission was ap-
pointed to scrutinize the law and the
facts and 20 recO mmend remedy.
Their examination specifically showed
the existence of great frauds upon the
public domain, and their recommen-
dations for changes in the law were
made with the design of conserving
the public land by putting it to its
best use. Attention was especially
called to the prevention of settlement
by the passage of great areas or pub
lie lands into the hands of a few men,
and to the enormous waste caused by
unrestricted grazing on the open
range; a system of using the natural
forage on the public domain which
amounts to putting a premium on its
destruction. The recommendation of
the public lands commission were
sound, for they were especially in the
interest of the actual home maker;
and where the small home maker
could not utilize the land, it was pro-
vided that the government should
keep control of it so that it could not
be monopolized by few wealthy men.
Congress has not yet acted upon these
recommendations. except for the re-
peal of the Ubiquitous lieu-land law.
But the recommendations are just and
proper, so essential to our national
welfare. that 1 believe they will
surely ultimately be adopted.
In 1891 congress authorized the
president to create national forests in
serves remained for long time in
charge of the general land office,
which had no men properly trained in
forestry. But another department,
that of agriculture. possessed the
trained men. In other words, the
government forests were without for
esters and the government foresters
without forests. Waste of effort and
waste of forests inevitably followed.
Finally the situation was ended in
1905 by the creation of the United
States forest service. which has stop
ped the waste conserved the re-
sources of the national forests. and
made them useful; so that our forests
are now being managed on a coherent
plan. and in a way that augurs we'll
for the future.
Mineral Resources
The mineral fuels of the eastern
United States have already passed into
the hands of large private owners, and