The movement which embodies this sentiment is as yet chiefly a private
effort, as I have said, but its influence is beginning to run through the
sentiment of the individualism which has so rapidly exploited the riches
of the valley and spent with such generous hand for the immediate future.
And the boundaries of public service are already enlarged in making room
for the previsions of the "Children of Always," as the mankind now in the
thought of conservationists may well be called.
Already millions of acres of coal lands have been withdrawn from private
entry, and plans are being made for the leasing of such lands; that is,
the people are to keep them for their own.
Like provision has also been made with respect to oil, natural gas, and
phosphate fields. Forest lands to the extent of nearly two hundred million
acres have been reserved as a perpetual national domain, and, in addition
to this, several States have forest reservations amounting to nearly ten
million acres. [Footnote: Van Hise, pp.
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