Since 1855, the Russian Government has arrived at one conclusion, and adopted a policy of reforesting this two hundred and forty thousand square miles worthy of imitation.
Let the Government of the United States do as Russia has been doing, and the steppes from the Missouri river to the mountains will be reclaimed and made to “blossom as the rose.” According to geological surveys there are seven hundred and fifty million acres of arid, treeless lands, incapable of successful cultivation without irrigation—but where trees can be grown—for experiments have shown that trees will grow where the rain-fall is insufficient for grain or grass.
According to J. W. Powell, director of the United States Geological Survey, on the water supply in the arid regions, it would seem if all the water run off could be impounded and appropriated to irrigation it would be insufficient to supply one-tenth of the arid districts. And it might be asked if the arid land in the Dakotas, Montana, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, California, New Mexico, Texas, Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska, and Indian Territory, only about “one hundred million acres” can be irrigated and made productive, what is to be done with the remaining six hundred and fifty million acres?
Could the area entire, or any part of the arid lands be made productive on the most economic plan yet devised by irrigation enterprise in this country, the cost of such lands and their products could never become profitably utilized in commerce so long as the vast area of cheap productive soil of the United States, or even that of the North-west lies out doors, ready to receive the showers of Heaven.
When we recount the miseries and misfortunes of the eight hundred million people that meagerly subsist on the products of irrigated, treeless lands, it makes an irresistible hope that the government of this nation may never be induced by ingenious descriptions of co-operative systems of economics, nor less perceptible but more powerful influences of speculators in western water-ways, to adopt a policy that will make any part of this country and nation, a Spain, a China, an India, or an Egypt, for want of forests.
Every country should have a just proportion of the total area in timber to make it healthful and productive. It is far better to have a portion in timber than to have all the country clothed with herds or covered with corn. It is the order of nature, the necessity of civilization, and the only true basis for a happy, powerful and independent population.
As the source for national revenue, it is an interest ranking first in importance, even in dollars and cents; and certainly, if for no other reason than for the wealth there is in it, the subject demands the attention of the government sufficiently to enforce protection and perpetuation. Every year it comes—“Once more the forests of the far west are aflame,” and it is not only the loss in money, but such sections of country are ruined for all purposes beyond the power of generations to repair.
It may seem expensive to maintain an army of officers and employes to protect and perpetuate the forests of the public domain. But notwithstanding it would require large appropriations, it would repay the outlay many thousand times in national wealth, for this great army would not be idlers. Nothing short of an organized department of forestry can protect and maintain this source of national wealth. The appropriation for this department in France has been five million dollars, and is returned with good interest.
Austria, not larger in extent of territory than the States of Illinois and Iowa combined, maintains thirty-two thousand forestry officers or employees and receives a large net income from this source; and reports show that Germany has an annual income of fifty-seven million dollars from an area of thirty-three million acres of timber, and it is estimated that no more is harvested each year than is compensated by growth and reoccupation of wasted ground. For, forest preservation does not mean that trees shall not be cut down, but that they shall be used, while all the conditions for their reproduction are steadily maintained from year to year, using if necessary, an amount equal to the production by growth. This requires planting, and tree-planting and forestry mean labor in this country as it does in Europe. The United States without Alaska, is, I believe, about nineteen times larger in area than Germany, and to be proportionately equal with this foreign power, the United States should have under control of the government an area of six hundred million acres as a reservation for timber to supply the public necessities of the near future. And it should be done without delay; the arid lands and forests along the streams and lakes that make the sources of the Mississippi and other navigable streams, should be dedicated forever to the cultivation of timber.
And here the labor question is solved. Every government that is able to sustain itself, must have something for idle hands to do. The increasing supply of labor has alarmed many thinking people. Labor is wealth, but how can all find employment? Which means bread. And various suggestions have been made simply to furnish subsistence. But in forestry there is something better—a necessity, a demand for labor, giving profitable employment to a vastly greater number than any other public necessity; for the labors of a department or bureau of this kind would be as immense as indispensable; and could end only with the end of the race.