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Show 520. recover from i t s earthquake, and was struggling to get out from under the corrupt p o l i t i c s of i t s past. The Lincoln-Roosevelt Republican League was t r y i n g to end the influence of the Southern Pacific Railroad. The Californian "Progressive" was beginning to be heard. More than ever before, the City was turning i t s a t t e n t i o n to i t s e l f , and was pursuing aspirations to partake of the World Power which Roosevelt promised. And newspapers like the B u l l e t i n which had been friendly to Muir in the past were heavily committed to t h i s new direction in Californian a s p i r a t i o n s . On top of t h a t , a fierce competition was growing between San Francisco and Los Angeles. In this time of growth, nobody in the West seemed interested in National Parks or wildernesses. Between 1905 and 1913, the Sierra Club might have learned important lessons in p o l i t i c s , and the nation might have come a l i v e to the importance of wilderness in i ts future. But i t is probably overly optimistic to argue as William Ever son does about Hetch Hetchy that This was one of the main turning points in the spiritual life of the nation, perhaps the chief turning point, as far as the future was concerned. It marked the real closing of the concept of unlimited expansion, and insisted on the point t h a t man was going to have to think of depriving himself, rather than abusing his environment. But more than t h a t , i t marked the moment when the implicit r e l i g i o u s a t t i t u d e s of the people gained explicit s t a t u s , and through a kind of reflex America violated i t s conscience, dammed the Hetch Hetchy, opted |