The Chronicle-star combined with the Moss Point advertiser., 1946-04-12
The Goose That Laid The Golden Eggs

the wood in that tree eventually becomes
twenty times more valuable when it turns
UP in the retail stores in the form of tables
and bookcases and radio cabinets. Crude
oil is worth a dollar or SO a barrel at the
well; but If the company pipes this oil to
another state and converts it to highest
gasoline, the value is increased many-fold
And of course the cabinet-makers who con-
verted the tree into furniture and the re-
finery workers who converted the oil into
gasoline get the biggest share of the wages
paid in the whole process.
All through its history. our state has
tragically failed to grasp this simple fact.
and has never made any effective effort
to require the processing of Mississippi
natural esourc in Mississippi. We per-
mitted the stripping of our timber Now
we are permitting the stripping of our oil
and gas. Our state legislature and our
governor. with short-sighted arguments.
have delivered themselves into the hands
of the outside oil interests. have failed to
adopt sound conservation measures. have
turned a deaf ear to arguments that Missis-
sippi's oil and gas is being rapidly drained
away into the out-of-state processing areas;
and in general. by killing sound conserva-
ton measures. they have cooperated with
the same forces which have kept this state
a colony of the manufacturing and finan-
ial sections of the country. We need oil re-
fineries in Mississippi. We need our
dwindling gas supply as a base and as an
attration for g~as-using industries. At a
federal conservation hearing recently in
Biloxi. the governor and other state Of
ficials testified against the conservation
move instituted by the more far-sighted
conservation department of Louisiana. and
supported the policy of sending Mississip-
pts natural gas out of the state without
restriction or check.
When our gas is gone, and our oil dwindl-
ing, then we will say what we are saying
now about our forests: I'VE should have
practiced conservation; we should nave beer
f~arsighted enough to encourage the rise Of
processing industries in Mississippi rather
than selling out for a song because the prof
its that way were quicker"
The profits are quicker that way, but the,
are smaller and are quickly exhausted. N,
one has told the story better than Aesop
who wrote the fable of the man who killed
the goose who laid the golden eggs. He coulc
have gotten one golden egg a day as Ions
as the goose lived, but he wanted severa
golden eggs in a hurry. We could nave KEEP
the golden income of our forests, forever
and our oil and gas for years to come. Blu
there are some people in this state Who hav,
ound their way to the control of thes,
things who want several golden eggs in
hurry.
And whenever a politician or a legislator,
adopt the short-sighted view, and oppos,
conservation measures, and permit the rapiC
exhaustion of resources, and make absolutel,
no effective effort to require the processin,
of some portion of these resources in Missis
sippi; then it can be; said with truth that. n,
matter what high-sounding speeches the,
make on the subject, they are the agents o
this policy, and that they will permit tn,
eventual exhaustion of the oil and gas in
dustry as surely as Monday follows Sunday
.