Evening star., 1937-03-07
BY MARK SULLIVAN.

~ HE other day. when neWsmen
went to President Roosevelt S
office for a semi-Weekly press
Il conference, the President en-
tertained them with a personal mat
ter. He had Just received and had
on his desk bill for s130. The bill
was for $4,000 three-year-old trees
which Mr. Roosevelt procured, as I
understood, from a New York State
official nursery. The young trees, so
the President said. were mainly
Douglas fir, balsam fir and Norway
spruce.
Because they were all evergreens
one of the neWsmen said something
about the President providing himself
with an ample supply of Christmas
trees-for use in his role of Santa
Claus. The President laughed, though
not with so much gusto as he some
times does; he. like many another, has
a preference for the jokes he makes
himself.
Mr.. Roosevelt said he was going to
plant the young trees on a part CT
his Hyde Park, N. Y, estate that is
eroded, has gullies. He is doing it
as an act of conservation; he is, he
said, practicing what he breaches.
Yet there is a difference between
what the President practices and
what he breaches. And hfs practice
is better than his preaching. He is
practicing conservation on his own
account, through his own effort. at his
own expense But his preaching. as
President. is that conservation be done
largely at Government expense.
Mr.. Roosevelt. as an individual land
owner. does not ask for any pater-
nalism from the Government. But
Mr.. Roosevelt as President likes to
practice paternalism for others-with
the taxpayers money. I suspect that
practicing paternalism is one way OF
agreeably expanding the ego. 1t must
be a grand and glorious feeling to have
command of all the money in the
United States Treasury to be benevo-
lent with.
Necessary to Pay Farmer"
Under Mr.. Roosevelt the Govern
ment pays farmers for planting trees,
terracing their land and otherwise
checking erosion. Apparently, as to
most farmers. it is necessary to pay
them-otherwise they don't do it.
Some farmers, it is true, keep their
land in good order. keep it free from
erosion-do it with their own work
and at their own expense. This con-
servation by farmers themselves is
encouraged by some States; the States
provide young trees at very small
expense, less than cost. Other States
grant immunity from taxes to land
planted with trees.
This process, self-conservation with
the encouragement of State govern
ments, had much momentum before
Mr.. Roosevelt and Mr.. Wallace decided
that conservation is Federal concern
Now that the Federal Government is
paying cash to farmers for doing what
they ought to do in their own interest
doubtless there will be little private
conservation. Farmers will do what
they ought to do, and what many
would have done at their own expense
but they will now get checks from
Washington for doing it.
Without doubt many farmers who
would not have done their own con.
serving will do it through the incentive
of pay from the Federal Government
But a farmer who does his own con-
serving is better farmer-and bet.
ter man-than one who does it be-
cause the Government pays him to.
What American Farmers Need.
The need for conservation in Amer.
lea to be achieved some way cannot
be denied. American farms as whole
have been seriously neglected. Yet
cannot help wondering why it is that
in America conservation requires Gov.
ernment incentive and Government
aid. Why have American farmer!
quite generally allowed their land tt
become eroded and gully torn? Why !.
it that in less than three centuries
much American farm land has seri'
ously deteriorated? In no part o
America have farms been under tht
plow for more than three centuries: II
the Middle West only a little over ont
century and in much of the West be-
yond the Mississippi less than CEN
tury. Yet much of our farm land |!
worn out, more of it in process of de.
terioration.
Why is America different in this re-
spect from European countries? II
TA..-a, rJ1llonI tho