The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1910-08-30
CONSERVATION DOES NOT
MEAN TYING UP RESOURCES
Opening Statement Of Theodore Roosevelt in His Speech
roper Methods Of Preserving COuntry's Re-
sources at Denver Yesterday.

titude in my own state of New York.
| Where the state alone had power TO
act, have done all could to get it
| to act In the most advanced manner;
and where the nation could act I have
done all l could to get national action
in the same direction. Unfortunately,
In the east we have in this matter paid
the penalty of not having our forest
land under national control; and the
penalty has been severe. Most u the
states-although they are old ssates-
have not protected their forests, each
failing to act by itself, because the ac-
ton was really the common CO lcern If
| all; and where action is the 'n,mcu
concern Of all, experience has shown
that It can only be probably under
taken by the national government.
AS a result of the impossibiIity Of
getting such wise action by the sew
eral state governments in the east,
we are doing our best to get national
legislation under which the national
government, at the expense OF millions
Of dollars, shall undertake to do as re-
CARDS the Appalachians and White
mountains of the east what is now
doing in the Rocky mountains here out
west. 1t would be both calamity and
an absurdity for the national govern
ment now to do in the west the ve"y
thing that a heavy pecuniary cost 1t
is trying to undo in the east. BY &C
tual experience in the east we have
found TO our cost that the nation, ani
not the several states, can best guard
the interests of the people in the mat
ter of the forests and the waters, and
that IL 1t fails to attempt this duty at
the outset 1T will later on have to pay
heavily in order to be allowed to take
UP the work, which, because it is done
so late, cannot be so we'll done as IL 1t
had been begun earlier.
Water Power.
Take the question of the control of
the water power sites. The enormous
Importance of water power sites to the
future industrial development of this
country has only been realized within
very few years. Unfortunately, the
realization has come too late as re-
CARDS many of the power sites; but
many yet remain with which our hands
are free to deal. We should make it
our duty to see that hereafter the
power sites are kept under the control
of the general government, for the use
of the people as a whole The fee
should remain with the people as
whole, while the use is leased on terms
which shall secure an ample reward
to the lessees, which shall encourage
the development and use of the water
power, but which shall not create
permanent monopoly or permit the de-
to be anti-social, to be in
any respect hostile to the public good
The nation alone has the power to do
this effectively, and it is for this rea-
son that you will find these CORPORA
tions which wish to gain improper adj
and to be freed from eff
cient control on the part of the public,
doing all that they can to secure the
substitution of state for national ac-
tion.
There is something fairly comic in
the appeal made by many Of these men
in favor of state control when you
realize that the great corporations
seeking the privileges of developing
the water power in any given state are
at least as apt to be owned outside the
state as within 1t. In this country,
capital has a national and
not state use The great corporations
which are managed and largely owned
in the older states are those which are
most in evidence in developing and US
ing the mines and water powers and
forests Of the new territories and the
new state from Alaska to Arizona.
/ have been genuinely amused during
the past two months at having argu-
ments presented to me on behalf of
certain rich men from New York and
Ohio, for instance, as to why Colorado
and other Rocky mountain states
should manage their own water power
sites. Now these men may be good
citizens according to their lights, but
naturally enough their special inter
ests obscure their sense of public need:
and as their object is to escape an
efficient control, exercised In the in
terest of all the people Of the coun-
try, they clamor to be put under the
state instead Of under the nation. If
we are foolish enough to grant their
requests, we shall have ourselves to
blame when we wake up and find that
We have permitted another privilege
TO intrench itself and another portion
of what should be kept for the public
good to be turned over to individuals
for purposes of private enrichment.