in a country where they must be employees or nothing, if they open their eyes in a land of merely regulated monopoly, where all the conditions of industry are determined by small groups of men, then they will see an America such as the founders of this Republic would have wept to think of. The only hope is in the release of the forces which philanthropic trust presidents want to monopolize. Only the emancipation, the freeing and heartening of the vital energies of all the people will redeem us. In all that I may have to do in public affairs in the United States I am going to think of towns such as I have seen in Indiana, towns of the old American pattern, that own and operate their own industries, hopefully and happily. My thought is going to be bent upon the multiplication of towns of that kind and the prevention of the concentration of industry in this country in such a fashion and upon such a scale that towns that own themselves will be impossible. You know what the vitality of America consists of. Its vitality does not lie in New York, nor in Chicago; it will not be sapped by anything that happens in St. Louis. The vitality of America lies in the brains, the energies, the enterprise of the people throughout the land; in the efficiency of their factories and in the richness of the fields that stretch beyond the borders of the town; in the wealth which they extract from nature and originate for themselves through the inventive genius characteristic of all free American communities. That is the wealth of America, and if America discourages the locality, the community, the self-contained town, she will kill the Nation. A nation is as rich as her free communities; she is not as rich as her capital city or her metropolis. The amount of money in Wall Street is no indication of the wealth of the American people. That indication can be found only in the fertility of the American mind and the productivity of American industry everywhere throughout the United States. If America were not rich and fertile, there would be no money in Wall Street. If Americans were not vital and able to take care of themselves, the great money exchanges would break down. The welfare, the very existence of the Nation, rests at last upon the great mass of the people; its prosperity depends at last upon the spirit in which they go about their work in their several communities throughout the broad land. In proportion as her towns and her countrysides are happy and hopeful will America realize the high ambitions which have marked her in the eyes of all the world. The welfare, the happiness, the energy and spirit of the men and women who do the daily work in our mines and factories, on our railroads, in our offices and ports of trade, on our farms and on the sea, is the underlying necessity of all prosperity. There can be nothing wholesome unless their life is wholesome; there can be no contentment unless they are contented. Their physical welfare affects the soundness of the whole Nation. How would it suit the prosperity of the United States, how would it suit business, to have a people that went every day sadly or sullenly to their work? How would the future look to you if you felt that the aspiration had gone out of most men, the confidence of success, the hope that they might improve their condition? Do you not see that just so soon as the old self-confidence of America, just so soon as her old boasted advantage of individual liberty and opportunity, is taken away, all the energy of her people begins to subside, to slacken, to grow loose and pulpy, without fibre, and men simply cast about to see that the day does not end disastrously with them? So we must put heart into the people by taking the heartlessness out of politics, business, and industry. We have got to make politics a thing in which an honest man can take his part with satisfaction because he knows that his opinion will count as much as the next man's, and that the boss and the interests have been dethroned. Business we have got to untrammel, abolishing tariff favors, and railroad discrimination, and credit denials, and all forms of unjust handicaps against the little man. Industry we have got to humanize,— not through the trusts, but through the direct action of law guaranteeing protection against dangers and compensation for injuries, guaranteeing sanitary conditions, proper hours, the right to organize, and all the other things which the conscience of the country demands as the workingman's right. We have got to cheer and inspirit our people with the sure prospects of social justice and due reward, with the vision of the open gates of opportunity for all. We have got to set the energy and the initiative of this great people absolutely free, so that the future of America will be greater than the past, so that the pride of America will grow with achievement, so that America will know as she advances from generation to generation that each brood of her sons is greater and more enlightened than that which preceded it, know that she is fulfilling the promise that she has made to mankind. Such is the vision of some of us who now come to assist in its realization. For wè Democrats would not have endured this long burden of exile if we had not seen a vision. We could have traded; we could have got into the game; we could have surrendered and made terms; we could have played the rôle of patrons to the men who wanted to dominate the interests of the country, and here and there gentlemen who pretended to be of us did make those arrangements. They couldn't stand privation. You never can stand it unless you have within you some imperishable food upon which to sustain life and courage, the food of those visions of the spirit where a table is set before us laden with palatable fruits, the fruits of hope, the fruits of imagination, those invisible things of the spirit which are the only things upon which we can sustain ourselves through this weary world without fainting. We have carried in our minds, after you had thought you had obscured and blurred them, the ideals of those men who first set their foot upon America, those little bands who came to make a foothold in the wilderness, because the great teeming nations that they had left behind them had forgotten what human liberty was, liberty of thought, liberty of religion, liberty of residence, liberty of action. Since their day the meaning of liberty has deepened. But it has not ceased to be a fundamental demand of the human spirit, a fundamental necessity for the life of the soul. And the day is at hand when it shall be realized on this consecrated soil,-a New Freedom,- a Liberty widened and deepened to match the broadened life of man in modern America, restoring to him in very truth the control of his Government, throwing wide all gates of lawful enterprise, unfettering his energies, and warming the generous impulses of his heart,— a process of release, emancipation, and inspiration, full of a breath of life as sweet and wholesome as the airs that filled the sails of the caravels of Columbus and gave the promise and boast of magnificent Opportunity in which America dare not fail. (Concluded) CONSERVATION THAT PAYS ITS WAY HOW THE TIMBER OWNERS OF THE NORTHWEST ARE PRACTISING FOREST PRESERVATION AT THEIR OWN EXPENSE AND MAKING MONEY BY DOING IT-A S NEW COOPERATIVE MOVEMENT THAT HAS BROUGHT ABOUT COR DIAL RELATIONS BETWEEN PRIVATE ENTERPRISES AND THE STATE AND NATIONAL GOVERNMENTS IN BY E. T. ALLEN EVEN years ago a few timber owners in northern Idaho joined under the name of Cœur d'Alene Timber Protective Association to develop the most effective methods of forest fire prevention. They decided to seek a maximum of efficiency and justice through financial coöperation on a basis of proportionate ownership. Complete by-laws were adopted, a treasurer was put under bond, and the members were pledged to pay such pro rata assessments as the directors should find necessary to equip and maintain an adequate patrol and fire-fighting system. From this beginning, contemplating only a local fire force somewhat like a city fire department, has grown a league of private fire associations that extends from Montana to California, that patrols a fifth of the Nation's entire timber supply, that is second only to the Federal Government itself in forest protective expenditure and achievement in the United States, and that probably leads all other agencies in influence for better handling of private forest land and in teaching the public to reduce the forest fire risk. A lookout on an Idaho peak sees smoke arising from a distant slope and, over an association-built telephone line, gives the alarm that soon sends a trained, equipped crew to the fire, over an association trail and supplied from a strategically located association tool and food depot. A Washington logger accumulates a dangerous quantity of inflammable débris that threatens him and his neighbors. An association "slash" burner, a specialist in dealing with such fire traps, comes to his assistance, prescribes necessary fire lines and removal of dead trees from which sparks may blow, selects a favorable time, stations his men, fires the slash at the right places, and the work is done. A patrolman riding an Oregon forest road stops now and then to nail upon a tree an association cartoon, depicting in vivid colors the community injury from carelessness with fire and giving travelers a few simple precautions, or to drop association illustrated circulars on the same subject in settlers' mail boxes. Children leaving a Montana schoolhouse carry home little booklets or puzzles teaching simple forestry lessons, distributed by the association by hundreds of thousands with the aid of the school authorities. Travelers on western trains find association-written fire precautions in timefolders and association books on forest conditions in observation-car libraries. Students at technical forestry schools everywhere look to association text books. for authority on the scientific management and replacement of Western forests. Public libraries supply these association books to lay researchers. Readers of a thousand newspapers on the Pacific Coast receive forest fire news collected systematically and issued in association despatches, as carefully prepared and as accurate as the reports of the Associated Press. Framers of forest laws look to association libraries and experts for reliable evidence upon the principles and execution of such legislation at home and abroad. State and Federal forest officials con sult and coöperate with association officials as systematically as they do with one another, not only in technical discussions but in the actual organization of forces, so that every agency, is practically a unit inca tremendous machine of men, trails, and telephones that work harmoniously from Montana to: California to safeguard the Nation's forest resources from fire. Association reports on fire preventive methods are used as manuals by practically all protective agencies, state and Federal, provincial and dominion, in the United States and Canada. Association forest fire conferences in Seattle, Portland, or Spokane, are attended by private and public fire officials from as wide a field. Association men are, as a matter of course, included in local or national boards, committees, and gatherings that are interested in forest protection. Such a rapid extension of public activities and influence in a movement of private and business origin is doubly significant because it has been achieved by lumbermen in a field of conservation where it might be expected that the public would prefer less interested leaders. The association succeeded because: 1. It did work and spent money before it asked others to work and spend. 2. It applied the principle of coöperation to both the work and the expenditure, and thereby forced the participants' keen interest to protect their investment. 3. It scrupulously avoided all work that was not of public as well as of private benefit. 4. It created machinery to force the mutual acquaintance and confidence of elements that had formerly, distrusted one another. a large owner of school-grant timber lands, recognized this and legislated to permit itself to join the associations, paying its pro rata with the private owners and giving association wardens police power. The state of Washington assisted by paying part of the fire-fighting bills, the association doing most of the patrolling and also having police power. It soon became apparent that this system went much further to impress the public than had individual effort. Careless settlers, campers, and loggers were far less apt to resent cautions from association patrolmen than from an individual timber owner or his employees. The protection of homes and resources was laudable even if not, wholly philanthropic, and the timber, owner was given credit for doing it himself instead of asking others to do it. With this came the realization not only that far better than fighting fires is having fewer fires to fight, but also that now the forest owner was in a position to campaign for fewer fires. In 1909, the five pioneer associations formed the Western Forestry and Conservation Association, to act as a clearing house for fire fighting and forestry methods, to engage in publicity and educational work, and to push the forming of more local associations in Montana, Oregon, and California. This. "five state" association, as it is often called, has no individual members, but comprises a league of the locals, each of which contributes according to its acreage. It is officered by leaders in the locals, and has a trustee and vice-president for each of the five states. A forester is employed by the association, which has its office in Portland. The amalgamation of so many 5. It employed modern publicity leaders in practical fire work under varymethods.. The pioneer Coeur d'Alene Association was soon followed by the Pend Oreille, Clearwater, and Potlatch associations in Idaho, and by an association that covers the entire western half of Washington. They have all demonstrated the efficiency of pro-rated patrol and fire fighting, especially because they have been directed by practical men with an interest in making every dollar count. The state of Idaho, ing conditions, each free to experiment and improve methods without the clog of official red tape, conservatism, or economy, created an unprecedented medium for advancing the science of forest protection. States and Government were quick to recognize this and their forest officials sought to participate. Without hesitation they were admitted as: noncontributing members, given equal place in discussion and committees, and the |