ment reservations, other than national parks, national monuments, and Indian reservations, which in the opinion of the Secretary of the department now administering the area and the Secretary of Agriculture are suitable for the production of timber, to be administered by the Secretary of Agriculture under such rules and regulations and in accordance with such general plans as may be jointly approved by the Secretary of Agriculture and the Secretary formerly administering the area, for the use and occupation of such lands and for the sale of products therefrom. That where such national forest is established on land previously reserved for the Army or Navy for purposes of national defense the land shall remain subject to the unhampered use of the War or Navy Department for said purposes, and nothing in this section shall be construed to relinquish the authority over such lands for purposes of national defense now vested in the department for which the lands were formerly reserved. Any moneys available for the maintenance, improvement, protection, construction of highways and general administration of the national forests shall be available for expenditure on the national forests created under this section. All receipts from the sale of products from or for the use of lands in such national forests shall be covered into the Treasury as miscellaneous receipts, forest reserve fund, and shall be disposed of in like manner as the receipts from other national forests as provided by existing law. Any person who shall violate any rule or regulation promulgated under this section shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction thereof shall be fined not more than $500 or imprisoned for not more than one year, or both.

STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN D. CLARKE, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEW YORK

Mr. CLARKE. Mr. Chairman, we have been assigned two days for the hearing on H. R. 4830, which is a companion bill of the McNary reforestation bill introduced in the Senate. This bill contemplates, and I will only explain it in a brief way, because we have competent witnesses who will go into the details of the thing, a great cooperative plan of getting inaugurated in this country a national policy and transferring it into a national law for reforestation.

Now, then, to go over the bill by sections in just a rough way: Sections 1 and 2 propose that the Secretary of Agriculture shall devise and recommend an adequate system of forest protection for the several States if cooperation is extended by those States in a financial

way.

Now, we have a very successful system only partially developed for the prevention of fires, and it is understandable by us especially who have attended these hearings of our committee and know of the work that we have done, that it is the forest fires that are causing 75 per cent of the damage to our great forests all over the United States.

Now, we want to extend this system.

Mr. SINCLAIR. Is there a law now providing for cooperative firefighting?

Mr. CLARKE. In part, yes. There are 50,000 annually in the United States. This contemplates the enlarging and development of a scheme of cooperation on the part of the Federal Government and the State, and with the proper agencies under State supervision and under Federal supervision. It is the first great step, as we see it, that we should now take along the line of forest conservation.

Now, conservation-and I want to give you my little idea of what conservation is, after all, in my mind, and I think it means so generally with this great sympathetic committee-conservation is a transferring of the policy of masterly inactivity or Micawberism into a

positive, permanent, forward-looking law, so that the public interests or commodities labeled for public use shall not be through our indifference or negligence so misused or so utilized or so capitalized in the to-day that the children of all the to-morrows shall seem forgotten, and that is exactly the great motive that is behind this bill.

China to-day stands out as preeminent in this as an example of what the lack of a reforestation policy naturally stands for-denuded hills, floods coming there, waters not being held because of lack of forestry upon the hills, rushing down and destroying millions of lives and silting up the rivers, with millions and millions of damage. Section 3 of the bill provides for extensive study of the tax laws of the State, and next to fire protection let me say that favorable tax laws in the States are an essential thing.

This bill does not enter into a controversial field seeking to impose upon the States laws that the Federal Government shall determine as a prerequisite to cooperations, but only goes so far that every man can go along encouraging the States and pointing out to the States the things, so far as taxation is concerned, that are proper.

Mr. ASWELL. Who does the studying?

Mr. CLARKE. The commission provided for here in this bill.
Mr. ASWELL. What will be the cost of that?

Mr. CLARKE. Sections 1, 2, and 3, $2,500,000, but that is also for the fire protection as well, and it is based on the assumption of the fullest cooperation, not alone with State agencies, but with private owners as well.

Section 4 contemplates cooperation of Federal and State governments in the way of furnishing forest tree seeds and plants, and it is worthy of note that there are 81,000,000 acres of denuded land in the United States now subject to reforestation and fit for reforestation; that the United States is practically reforesting by planting about 30,000 acres, while Japan is reforesting over 300,000 acres per annum. This provides $100,000 appropriation in order to cooperate with the States, and I say the whole motive of this bill is to cooperate with the present State agencies and private agencies under the supervision and approval of the State and Federal Governments. Section 5 authorizes the Secretary of Agriculture, in cooperation with the States or their officials, to assist and advise the farmers and others in establishing, improving, and renewing wood lots, shelter breaks, wind breaks, and provides $100,000 in appropriation.

Section 6 amends the Weeks Act, and authorizes the Secretary to purchase, subject to the National Reforestation Commission-and I will say that Mr. Hawley of that commission will appear before this committee to-morrow subject to the National Reforestation Commission, to take over cut-over or denuded lands within watersheds of navigable streams whose acquisition is necessary for the regulation of the flow of navigable streams or for the production of timber.

Section 7 supplements the right to purchase by authorizing the acceptance of gifts and bequests, subject to reservation, from private owners, who would turn over to the Government this land and would reserve the mineral rights, or would want the right to cut the timber now standing, where the Federal Government finds that this land may be taken into a national forest under an economical administration plan, that fits into the plan of the National Government. It gives the Government the right to accept those devises and bequests,

and right now some of the Southern States are urging and have urged the Senate Agriculture and Forestry Committee to nationalize the forests in some of the Southern States in order that we might start the growing of timber on some of these denuded lands, because they need that lumber in order to manufacture the containers in which to send the agricultural products from those States.

Section 8 authorizes the Secretary as follows:

SEC. 8. That the Secretary of Agriculture is hereby authorized to ascertain and determine the location of public lands chiefly valuable for stream-flow protection or for timber production, which can be economically administered as parts of national forests, and to report his findings to the National Forest Reservation Commission established under the act of March 1, 1911 (Thirty-sixth Statutes at Large, page 961), and if the commission shall determine that the administration of said lands by the Federal Government will protect the flow of streams used for navigation or for irrigation, or will promote a future timber supply, the President is hereby authorized, in his discretion, to add said lands to existing national forests, thereby making them subject to all laws and regulations applicable to national forests.

It is necessary to show that it can be economically administered, and the Secretary reports to the National Reforestation Commission. If that commission O. K's it, then the President is authorized to incorporate such land into a national forest.

There are now over 600,000 acres in our military reservations that are adapted primarily to reforestation. The Secretary of War has already approved-and by the way, Secretary of War Weeks was the father of the Weeks Act under which we are acquiring millions of acres that will go far toward keeping up the flow of our streams. Mr. SINCLAIR. Would this contemplate the buying of any new lands?

Mr. CLARKE. No; the taking of those lands already in.

The Chief Forester, Colonel Greeley, is here. He has arranged a program, and I will turn the meeting over to him.

Mr. RUBEY. Would your bill apply to States like western Kansas, Oklahoma, and western Texas?

Mr. CLARKE. If the lands were primarily more useful for the regrowing of trees and reforesting and were in reservations, I should

say so.

Mr. JOHNSON. How would it apply to the watersheds of Ohio? You know we have big floods there. Would it apply to that? Mr. CLARKE. Yes, indeed.

Mr. KINCHELOE. I got in a little late, but I want to say that I have always been an advocate of this Weeks bill. I think it is the greatest thing in the world. Does this bill contemplate taking over the activities of the Weeks Act?

Mr. CLARKE. It simply enlarges the power under the Weeks Act. You have got to keep them within the constitutional authority under the Weeks Act. It contemplates giving such added power as we can, and that has been very carefully considered by the solicitor in the Forest Service. But that will be amplified a little later.

With your consent, I will turn this meeting over to Colonel Greeley. Colonel GREELEY. Mr. Chairman, with your approval, I will call first Mr. R. S. Kellogg, chairman of the National Forestry Committee.

STATEMENT OF MR. R. S. KELLOGG, CHAIRMAN OF THE NATIONAL FORESTRY COMMITTEE

Mr. KELLOGG. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, I will try to make this as brief as I can, because time has been lost. In the first place, I simply want to say that there is nothing of a new or revolutionary or untried character proposed in this new legislation. It is entirely the logical outcome of 50 years' work to establish somewhere near an adequate national-forest policy for the United States.

We do not say that the pending program is a complete one. We do say that it has gone further than anything else that has come this far along, and we are strongly for it.

This long course of discussions and publications and hearings and addresses all over the United States that has been going on has clearly crystallized a practical, workable program, and has clearly set up in the minds of people who have paid any attention to the subject that there are certain things that we absolutely have to do.

The first is effective fire prevention on both the public and privately owned forest lands of this country. It makes no difference who owns it. The first thing is fire prevention.

The second is scientific utilization of our forest crops.

The third, as was so strongly indicated by Mr. Clarke this morning, is the ultimate necessity for tree planting on a large scale in this country, by both public and private interests, to bring back into productivity great areas that fire had rendered absolutely barren heretofore.

Fourth, we must have in this country a substantial proportion of well-distributed forest land in public ownership upon which there may be grown the older age classes and the larger sizes of timber which we must have and which we can not expect in adequate quantity from lands in private ownership for a long time to come. We have to have a large proportion of forest land, that backbone of the country's supply, in public ownership, some national, some State, but very largely national.

In this connection, it is utterly futile and gets nowhere to talk about depending on foreign sources for our supply of wood products. We get a little, but never will get the bulk of our requirements there, and it is waste of time and a neglect of our duty to talk about depending on foreign countries for the bulk of what we will need. We have to create what we need here to use in our industries.

Mr. TINCHER. We have had a great many hearings on the forestry plan. Has this bill been indorsed by the Forestry Service?

Mr. KELLOGG. I understand that it has; yes, sir.

Mr. TINCHER. And has it been submitted to my friend Gifford Pinchot?

Mr. CLARKE. Yes; Mr. Pinchot approves it.

Colonel GREELEY. It doesn't go as far as he thinks we ought to go, but he approves this as a partial step.

Mr. TINCHER. I was serious about it, because I understood the Forestry Service was unanimous for the bill.

Mr. KELLOGG. That is so, and that is what I was endeavoring to bring out, that the present bill embodies the thing on which there is substantial agreement. It is not an extreme bill. It is a practical

bill.

Mr. ASWELL. The timber owners in the country-I mean the land owners are strongly inclined to the thought that it is the duty of the private citizen. Does this bill cooperate with the individual citizen toward reforesting?

Mr. KELLOGG. Yes, sir; that is one of the strong features of it. I am speaking now as chairman of the national forestry program committee, as I have spoken in the last three years.

Mr. ASWELL. The Southern Pine Association went on record the other day as favorable to owners of land being strongly encouraged to do their own reforesting.

Mr. KELLOGG. That is part of this program.

Mr. ASWELL. This in no way interferes?

Mr. KELLOGG. This encourages it. This is based on the wellknown fact that we have 80 per cent of our forest area in this country in private ownership and 20 per cent in public ownership, and that no matter how much we may do, and I hope we will go a good deal further in extending public ownership, the bulk of our timber supply will undoubtedly be in private ownership and we have to look to that private ownership, and we have to cooperate with the people who own that land to get that supply.

Mr. VOIGT. Is it the theory that the Federal Government should spend money to give fire protection to privately owned land?

Mr. KELLOGG. Only in small proportion, based on what the private owner does himself. If the private owner doesn't do anything himself, he is going to be left out in the cold, as he ought to be.

Mr. ASWELL. It is a 50-50 proposition?

Mr. KELLOGG. That is, not to exceed 50, and in actual practice it will be a good deal less than that, because there will not be enough actual funds to make it more.

We presented to this committee in the hearings on the Snell bill in January, 1921, and again in January, 1922, of which you have a record here, an outline of what we regarded as a complete and practical forest policy for the United States. I am not going back over those hearings. You have them here. I simply want to say at this time that the pending Clarke bill, so far as it goes, is based entirely on the principles upon which the national forestry program committee has been standing and coming down here year after year and asking you to put into law, and we are right behind the Clarke bill at this time because it goes in that direction.

There are certain definite things that we had thought should be particularly emphasized. There should be this continual building up of publicly administered forestry areas, through exchange, through purchase, through putting into forest administration lands now in the public domain that is being left to burn up. That should be carried forward until eventually we think we should have 40 per cent of the total forest area of these United States in some kind of public ownership, partly national, partly State, and so on.

Here is this other feature of the thing: While, as I said a minute ago, there is about 20 per cent of our total forest area in public ownership, taking our 470,000,000 acres of potential forest land in the United States, from the Rocky Mountains west we have 70 per cent of the forest area in public ownership and from the Rockey Mountains east only 3 per cent. The situation is absolutely un