IV State conservation and planning, in the trial and error method of our many commonwealths, with widely different problems, struggling toward ideals of prosperity and liberty in a framework of free society. But to those of us who have watched the trends of American institutions, these stages of development are of the very greatest importance in the national evolution. They mark the beginnings of a form of planning which is at once democratic and decentralized, although united with a national program of national American action. They mark the beginning of a movement which will bring about the utilization in Nation and State of the fullest possibilities of our national productive assets and talents. From this will emerge far higher standards of American living, material and human, in a new era where the promise of American democracy is at last fully realized. December 1938. CHARLES E. MERRIAM. TABLE OF CONTENTS The Canal Era: "Planned Systems" of Internal Improvements. Page 101-102 10-12 LIST OF FIGURES 1. Growth of State Agencies for Game Conservation 2. Growth of State Agencies for Forest Conservation 3. Growth of State Park Agencies 4. Development of the State Geological Surveys 5. Growth of State Agencies for Fish Conservation 6. Growth of State Education Agencies 7. Growth of State Health Agencies 8. Growth of State Bureaus of Labor Statistics 9. Growth of State Welfare Agencies 10. State Conservation Agencies, 1908-11 TABLES 1. State Conservation Commission Legislation, 1908–13 2. Scope of Activities of the Roosevelt State Conservation Commission as Indicated by Reports 3. Integration of the State Management of Natural ResourcesAgencies Absorbed or Superseded 4. The State Management of Natural Resources-Agencies and Func tions CHRONOLOGICAL CHARTS Main Events in New York's Management of Resources VI INTRODUCTION This study of trends in conservation of State resources is divided into three parts. Part I is concerned with general trends in the growth of the State management of resources in terms of the emerging governmental functions, structures, and techniques of control. Part II consists of four chapters dealing with specific topical trends, i. e., the growth of the State management of land, mineral, water, and human resources. Part III traces the emergence of a technique of comprehensive planning of resources and its institutional incorporation into the framework of State government. Both the opening and concluding parts of the study relate to the conservation of resources considered as a whole, whereas the middle part consists of a series of topical chapters dealing with specific resources. The first part treats of the comparative functions, institutional structures, and strategy of resources management, whereas the concluding part relates the origin and development of the technique of comprehensive planning in the State conservation of resources. It is the purpose of this study to point out, in the period before 1933, some of the long streams of governmental interests and activities which, under the general term "conservation," have led to conservation and planning for resources. In their inception and early growth the antecedent ideas and practices of State conservation were naturally crude in form, limited in scope to specific resources (i. e., wildlife, forests, etc.), intermittent in duration, and largely incidental to other activities of the State government. With the general growth of State conservation activities these precedents for planning have grown stronger until State planning has officially emerged in almost all the States. In delimiting the scope of the study, the word "resources" has been used to include the conventional classification of natural resources, such as land (which subsumes forests and wildlife), minerals, and water, and also human resources, which have been treated in somewhat less detail than the former. The study is not concerned with national planning or local community planning, although certain of these aspects of American planning history have been incidentally touched upon. Conservation, in this study, is used in the meaning which Theodore Roosevelt gave it 30 years ago. It involves not just preservation but also wise use of resources. Management connotes organization, direction of policy towards specific objec tives, and sometimes prohibits or controls. In this sense, it is not to be confused with planning, which in this study as in all publications of State planning boards is strictly an advisory research and coordinating function. Planning is understood in this study in terms of the comprehensive, projective assembly and analysis of data, with a deliberate view to forecasting and devel oping alternative proposals for concerted action, as they may be fitted into acceptable public policies and may be administered as part of the prevailing VIII social system. As part of this task planning involves the problem of coordinating pertinent phases of national, regional, State, and local life, and may point out how coordination may be achieved, so as to effectuate in the fullest measure whatever basic policies and objectives that the duly constituted policy makers have adopted. A variety of source materials has been used in the study-State constitutions, statutes and court decisions, legislative journals, Governors' messages, public documents and reports, yearbooks, directories and manuals, special surveys, biographies and other personal and nonofficial writings, and data obtained by interview and correspondence with public officials and by schedules sent to the State planning boards. The session laws of the State of New York have been carefully examined from colonial days to the present time, while the legislation of other States has been utilized by means of the Index of Legislation prepared by the New York State Library for the period 1891-1908 and the State Law Index prepared by the Legislative Reference Service of the Library of Congress for the period 1925 to date. There is no comprehenisve index to State legisla tion for the intervening period 1909-24, but the Public Information Service (1914 to date) and the American Yearbook (1910-19) indicate certain prominent legislative enactments. For certain cardinal facts of the study a specific search has been made of the general statutes and session laws of each State. Extensive use has been made of such guides to State publications as Hasse's Index of Economic Materials in Documents of the States of the United States, including the States of California, Delaware, Illinois, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont for the general period 1789-1904. The publications of the remaining States have been checked in Bowker's Provisional List of the Official Publications of the Several States of the United States for the same general period, while the more recent State publications have been checked in the Monthly Checklist of State Publications prepared by the Library of Congress for the period 1910 to date. In tracing the development of the State conservation agencies, a special effort was made to obtain all written evidence of their activities. Where published reports could not be located in the Chicago libraries or the Library of Congress, inquiries were made of the secretaries of State, with a copy thereof sent to the State library. Where this search uncovered no reports, it has been concluded that the alleged conservation agency did not function. The data for the table on present State agencies engaged in the management of natural resources were obtained by inquiries addressed to the State planning boards, National Resources Committee consultants, and (for Delaware) local research agencies. In rough form the data had already been collected from the official manuals and directories issued by the individual States and from direc tories of special State agencies prepared by the United States Biological Survey, Geological Survey, Forest Service, and Public Health Service. These provisional data were transferred to one-page schedules (Appendix) which were then sent to the executive officers of the State planning boards with the request that they correct and supplement the schedules and return them to Chicago. The schedules have been tabulated as a Check List of State Agencies and Officials Concerned With the Management of Natural Resources, which is believed to represent the first attempt at a comprehensive listing in a single source of all the State agencies that are engaged in the various phases of the management of natural resources. Acknowledgments.-This study has grown out of an original suggestion of Prof. Charles E. Merriam. Profs. Leonard D. White and Harold F. Gosnell, of the University of Chicago; Charles S. Ascher, secretary of the committee on |