I have referred to the course of the last administration and of the present one in making withdrawals of government lands from entry under homestead and other laws and of congress in removing all doubt as to the validity of these withdrawals as a great step in the direction of practical conservation. But it is only one of two necessary steps to effect what should be our purpose. It has produced a status quo and prevented waste and irrevocable disposition of the lands until the method for their proper disposition can be formulated. But it is of the utmost importance that such withdrawals should not be regarded as the final step in the course of conservation, and that the idea should not be allowed to spread that conservation is the tying up of the natural resources of the government for indefinite withholding from use and the remission to remote generations to decide what ought to be done with these means of promoting present general human comfort and progress. For, if so, it is certain to arouse the greatest opposition to conservation as a cause, and if it were a correct expression of the purpose of conservationists it ought to arouse this opposition. Real conservation involves wise, non-wasteful use in the present generation with every possible means of preservation for succeeding generations; and though the problem to secure this end may be difficult, the burden is on the present generation promptly to solve it and not to run away from it as cowards, lest in the attempt to meet it we may make some mistake. As I have said elsewhere, the problem is how to save and how to utilize, how to conserve and still develop; for no sane person can contend that it is for the common good that nature's blessings should be stored only for unborn generations.
I beg of you, therefore, in your deliberations and in your informal discussions, when men come forward to suggest evils that the promotion of conservation is to remedy, that you invite them to point out the specific evils and the specific remedies; that you invite them to come down to details in order that their discussions may flow into channels that shall be useful rather than into periods that shall be eloquent and entertaining, without shedding real light on the subject. The people should be shown exactly what is needed in order that they make their representatives in congress and the state legislature do their intelligent bidding.
