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Senate Bill 5228: Senator Simmon's speech

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  • 14 have not named. The Blue Ridge Mountains is the great divida between those which flow northeastward, eastward, or southeastward into the Atlantic and those which flow southward, westward, and northwestward, ultimately reaching the Gulf. Can it be said that a proposition which affects so intimately the agriculture and the manufacturing of the immediate and adjacent locality, which affects the navigation and the commerce of these great water highways, penetrating a dozen States of the Union, is not a national question? A considerable portion of these lands are located in North Carolina, but the streams which take their rise there spread out and pass through or border nearly all the Southern States and Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. Even if North Carolina were able to do what we are now asking the Government to do (and of course it is not, because it would require the entire revenue of the State for several years to purchase the land), it should not be required to do it, because the benefit resulting from the work will be as great to the other States through which these streams run as to North Carolina. It is true that New York and Pennsylvania are establishing local forest reserves, but these will protect the sources of streams lying wholly within their borders, and the benefit is local, confined to the State in which the forest is situated. Mr. President, I do not desire to detain the Senate to discuss another important phase of this question except in a very general way: That of the establishment of a great national health and pleasure resort. This is a subordinate purpose in the establishment of this great forest reserve, but it is none the less an important one. We all know how rapidly the country is being settled, how population is increasing, how rapidly its lands are being cleared and brought under cultivation, and it is obvious that something should be done to preserve here and there a spot where the tired and weary toiler can come in touch with primeval nature and can find rest and fresh air and space in which to recuperate his exhausted energies. There is not a national parkin the whole Eastern region, the nearest being the Yellowstone Park, 2,000 miles away, and there is not a national forest reserve this side of the Dakotas, about 1,800 miles away. The proposed forest reserve will be within twenty-four hours' ride of more than half the population of the United States—the great cities of New York. Philadelphia, Chicago, and the populous region of the whole North and Central West, as well as the South. It is one of the most beautiful spots upon the earth. On the west are the high summits of the Smoky and the Unaka mountains, and irregularly parallel on the east is the Blue Ridge, while there are hundreds of cross ridges rising from five to more that six thousand feet above the sea level, with valleys and plateaus and table-lands intersected with mountain brooks and streams. Seventy-five per cent of this region is still covered with forests which are generally conceded to be greater in variety and extent than any other hard-wood or broad-leaved forests on the continent. Many of these mountain slopes and ravines have never yet been invaded by the man with the ax. The mingling here in vigorous growth of the trees and shrubs of Canada with those of the extreme Southern States shows how well adapted is this region in general climatic conditions as a meeting ground for people from all portions of this country. Its light air, which in the valleys is 5333
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