This  is  not  the  project  of  a  dreamer.  It  is  a
measure  introduced  by  a  practical  statesman.  He  dis-
claims any  intention  to  speak  for  any  one  but  him-
self; but  it  is  an  open  secret  that  the  Newlands  Bill
in  large  measure  represents  the  plans  of  the  Forest
Service  headed  by  Gifford  Pinchot,  of  the  water  re-
sources branch  of  the  Geological  Survey  represented
by  Marshall  O.  Leighton,  of  the  Reclamation  Service
in  the  person  of  Director  Newell,  of  Dr.  McGee  the
erosion  expert,  of  Secretary  Wilson,  and,  formerly,  of
President  Roosevelt  himself.
The  Newlands  bill,  like  the  Appalachian  Forest
measure,  may  not  pass;  but  there  lies  back  of  each  of
them  such  an  array  of  arguments  pointing  to  an  im-
perative national  duty,  that  it  seems  impossible  for
either  of  them  wholly  to  fail.  Their  passage  would
mean  the  enthronement  of  science  and  the  dethrone-
ment of  the  smaller  and  meaner  politics  of  many
Washington  services.  It  would  mean  a  sort  of  revo-
lution— and  even  the  most  beneficent  revolution  never
has  things  all  its  own  way.
A  look  at  what  we  have  done  as  to  waterway  im-
provement, and  our  manner  of  doing  it,  will  illustrate
this.  In  the  fully-developed  waterway  systems  of
France,  Germany,  and  the  Low  Countries — our  com-
petitors in  the  world's  markets — there  is  a  mile  of
waterway  for  every  twenty-three  square  miles  of  area.
