Page:State vs. National Control of Public Forests.pdf/10

 have stated, the tax argument is based on private ownership. a proposition now openly advocated by but few and not involved in this discussion.

WHAT is the state's real interest in the national forests and their administration? In conservation and use for all purposes. Every foot of land available for settlement and home making should be open to settlers. Every encouragement should be given the settler. The use of resources of every kind within the national forests should be promoted. The sheep and cattle man, the mining prospector, the engineer looking for power to develop and use, all should be encouraged. In other words, the interest of the state lies in use. However, to secure this condition does not require a change of ownership or abandonment of public control. On the contrary, conditions favoring the largest use in every form, represent both the purpose of the law and the policy of the agricultural department.

INDEED from a practical standpoint the state today is in a better position than if it owned the forests. The protection of the forests is paid for by the federal government, and the state receives 35 per cent of the gross revenue. The experiments and studies as to use, etc., of which we receive the beneﬁt, are carried on by the government. Not a tree can be felled- and transformed into lumber without leaving 80 per cent of the receipts in the hands of labor and those furnishing supplies. Is it to be assumed the state's management would be more efficient, less expensive, and more satisfactory than that of the Forest Service? Or would the result he that which is desired by some—dissatisfaction, criticism, and finally sale, and the public forest gone forever? Are not private forest lands now held in few enough hands, or can it be the desire to make the monopoly complete and have this necessity of life

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