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Show 566 HISTORY OF PUBLIC LAND LAW DEVELOPMENT value or not, as public reservations. . . ." 3 A memorial of the American Forestry Association of October 1889, throws much light on the background of this amendment. The AFA petitioned Congress for legislation to require the withdrawal from sale of distinctly forest land, as recommended by the Secretaries of the Interior for the past three administrations, to give the forest lands protection, and to authorize the President to appoint a commission to determine what "regions . . . should be held permanently in forest" and to present a plan for a national forest administration. The association had little reason to approve the unrestricted free cutting which the Revision Act of 1891 tolerated, but could hope that the authority it gave for making withdrawals would be used to save the best of the remaining public tim-berlands for controlled management.4 Sporadic congressional interest in preserving areas of superlative natural beauty and uniqueness had already caused several areas to be withheld from private ownership. Four sections of the Hot Springs of Arkansas had been set aside for "future disposal" in 1832; in 1864 the "Cleft" or "Gorge" and the headwaters of the Merced River "known as the Yo-Semite Valley" and the "Mariposa Big Tree Grove" of giant sequoias had been granted to California to be held "inalienable for all time" for "public use, resort, and recreation." In 1872 2 million acres on the Upper Yellowstone in Wyoming Territory had been reserved from "settlement, occupancy, or sale," and dedicated "as a public park or pleasuring ground for the benefit and enjoyment of the people." In 1875 the public lands on J26 Stat. 1095. In the discussion in the House it was brought out that the Anaconda Copper mine in Montana used as much as 30 million feet of squared timber worth $300,000 yearly, presumably all cut from public lands, and judging by the discussion such use was to be tolerated under the amendment. Cong. Record, 51st Cong., 1st sess., p. 10091. *Cong. Record, 51st Cong., 1st sess., p. 2539. ,- Old Faithful Geyser, Yellowstone National Park National Park Service Mackinac Island in Michigan had been set aside as a "National public park or grounds for health, comfort, and pleasure, for the benefit and enjoyment of the people", but this park was not to survive. Finally in 1890 two acts withdrew from all forms of entry some 2 million acres in the mountains back of the Yosemite Valley and other land in present Sequoia National Park-the former area was to be "set apart as reserved forest lands" and the latter was "dedicated and set apart as a public park or pleasure ground. . . ." 5 The preamble 8 Act of April 20, 1832, 4 Stat. 405; Act of June 30, 1864, 13 Stat. 325; Act of March 1, 1872, 17 Stat. 32; Act of March 3, 1875, 18 Stat. 517; Acts of Sept. 25 and Oct. 1, 1890, 26 Stat. 478, 651. As John Ise in Our National Park Policy (Baltimore, 1961), has said, from 1890 to 1906 "Yosemite was a moun- |