RAILROAD ENCROACHMENT AND CHANGE OF BOUNDARY.
Nearly all of the enterprises that have been put forward in opposition to the true interests of the Reservation partake of the nature of railroad encroachment. Without entering into the merits of particular projects, it will be sufficient to explain in general terms the reasons why the government has always opposed them.
Railroads in the Yellowstone Park are objectionable because:
(1.) They will mar, and in places destroy, that natural condition which is one of its greatest charms. From the first it has been the wish of those who know any thing of the Yellowstone that it should remain as nature made it. The instructions of the Interior Department to the first Superintendent of the Park, two months after the Act of Dedication became a law, thus announced the policy of the government upon this subject:
“It is not the desire of the Department that any attempts shall be made to beautify or adorn this reservation, but merely to preserve from injury or spoliation the timber, mineral deposits, and various curiosities of that region, so far as possible, in their natural condition.”
It requires no argument to show that nothing would so interfere with this natural condition as the construction of a railroad through that country; and the danger involved in these projects early became apparent to all who were well acquainted with the situation. As early as 1883, Lieutenant Kingman thus refers to this subject in his annual report, wherein he describes his proposed road system for the Park:
"The plan for improvement which I have submitted is given in the earnest hope and upon the supposition that it [the Park] will be preserved as nearly as may be as the hand of nature left it—a source of pleasure to all who visit it, and a source of wealth to no one. If the Park ever becomes truly popular and national, it will be when the people come to know and appreciate its delightful summer climate, the wonderful efficiency of its baths and its mineral waters, as well as the natural wonders, beauties and curiosities to be seen there. Then, if there are numerous small, quiet hotels scattered here and there throughout the Park, where visitors can have plain and simple accommodations at moderate prices, the overworked and the sick, as well as the curious, will come here, not to be awed by the great falls and astounded by the geysers, and then to go away, but will come here and will remain for weeks and months, and will find what they seek, rest, recreation and health. But if it ever becomes the resort of fashion, if its forests are stripped to rear mammoth hotels, if the race-course, the drinking saloon and gambling-table invade it, if its valleys are scarred by railroads, and its hills pierced by tunnels, if its purity and quiet are destroyed and broken by the noise and smoke of the locomotive; … then it will cease to belong to the whole people, and will interest only those that it helps to enrich, and will be unworthy the care and protection of the National Government."
The history of the twelve years since the above was written confirms in every point this forcible presentation of the case.