The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1908-05-13

stores OF mineral Oil and gas are
largely gone. Our natural waterways
are not gone, but they have been so
injured by neglect, and by the division
or responsibility and utter lack of syS-
tenn In dealing with them, that there
is less navigation on them now than
there was fifty years ago. Finally, we
began with soils of unexampled fer
tility and we have so impoverished
them by lnJudiciOuS use and by failing
to check erosion that their crop pro-
ducing power is diminishing instead
OF increasing. In a word. we have
thoughtlessly, and to a large degree
unnecessarily, diminished the resources
upon which not only our prosperity but
the prosperity of our children must
always depend.
We have become great because of
the lavish use of our resources and
we have just reason to be proud of
our growth. But the time has come
to inquire seriously what will happen
when our forests are gone, when the
coal. the iron, the oil, and the gas are
exhausted, when the soils shall have
been still further impoverished and
washed into the streams, polluting the
rivers, denuding the fields, and OBJ
structing navigation. These questions
do not relate only to the next century
or to the next generation. 1t is time
for us now as a nation to exercise the
QeaInR
with our great natural resources that
would be shown by any prudent man
in conserving and widely using the
property which contains the assurance
of well-being for himself and his chill
dren.
Division of Natural Resources.
The natural resources have enumer-
ated can be divided into two sharply
distinguished classes accordingly as
a r0 ~ Of Ill
Mines If used must necessarily be ex-
hausted. The minerals do not and
can not renew themselves. Therefore
in dealing with the coal, the oil, the
gas, the iron, the metals generally,
all that we can do is to try to see
that they are wisely used The ex-
haustion is certain to come in time
The second class of resources con-
sists of those which can not only be
used in such manner as to leave them
undiminished for our children, but
can actually be improved by wise use.
The soil, the forests. the waterways
come in this category. In dealing with
mineral resources, man is able to i'm
prove on nature only by putting the
resources to a beneficial use which in
the end exhausts them; but in dealing
with the soil and its products man can
improve on nature by compelling the
resources to renew and even recon-
struct themselves in such manner as
to serve increasingly beneficial uses
while the living waters can be so con-
trolled as to multiply their benefits.
Neither the primitive man nor the
pioneer was aware of any duty to pos
terity in dealing with the renewable
resources. When the American settler
felled the forests, he felt that there
was plenty of forest left for the sons
who came after him. When he ex-
hausted the soil of his farm he felt
that his son could go west and take GI
another. So it was with his immediate
successors. When the soil-wash from
the farmers fields choked the neigh
boring river he thought only of using
the railway rather than boats for NOV
ing his produce and supplies.
Now all this is changed On the
average the son of the farmer of to-
day must make his living on his faith.
er's farm. There is no difficulty in
wisdom. No wise use of a farm ex-
| hausts its fertility So with the for
ests. We are over the verge of tim
Der famine in this country, and it is
objectionable for the nation or the
! states to permit any further cuttine
| of our timber save in accordance with
| a system which will provide that the
next generation shall see the timber
| increased instead of diminished. More
| over, we can add enormous tracts OF
the IIlOSt |dludUie poSSlpie AGRICULTURE
| land to the national domain by irriga-
| ton in the arid and senniarid regions
| and by drainage of great tracts OF
| swamp land in the humid regions We
can enormously increase our trans
portation facilities by the canalizatior
| of our rivers so as to complete a grea
| system of waterways on the Pacific
! Atlantic, and Gulf coasts and in the
Mississippi valley, from the grea
plains to the Alleghenies and from the
! northern lakes to the mouth of the
! mighty Father of Waters. But al
| thess various uses of our natural re
/ sources are so closely connected tha
| they should be coordinated, and SHOULD
be treated as part of one coherent plar