Approximately one-half of the area of the Capital is under Government control and one-half is open to private development. That private development should proceed in harmony with the plans of the local and Federal Governments was acceptable as an ideal, and a determined effort was made in 1918 to introduce zoning into Washington. In that year and the year following congressional committees, the District Commissioners, and others formulated plans, and a zoning bill became a law effective August 30, 1920. After a period of 18 years, during which several important changes in the law had suggested themselves, Congress adopted a new Zoning Act, which was approved by the President on June 20, 1938 (Public, No. 684, 75th Congress). The act provides that the regulations heretofore adopted by the Zoning Commission under the authority of the act of March 1, 1920, including official maps, shall be deemed to have been made and adopted and in force under this present act. The act empowers the Zoning Commission “to regulate the location, height, bulk, number of stories, and size of buildings and other structures, the percentage of lot which may be occupied, the sizes of yards, courts, and other open spaces, the density of population, and the uses of buildings, structures, and land for trade, industry, residence, recreation, public activities, or other purposes * * *.” Many people do not understand the importance and necessity of a zoning law in a city; they think it deprives them of private rights. Yet without a good zoning law living conditions in cities of the present day become chaotic. Section 2 of the act of June 20, 1938, sets forth the purpose of the zoning regulations and also points out the benefits to be derived from zoning, as follows: Such regulations shall be made in accordance with a comprehensive plan and designed to lessen congestion in the street, to secure safety from fire, panic, and other dangers, to promote health and the general welfare, to provide adequate light and air, to prevent the undue concentration of population and the overcrowding of land, and to promote such distribution of population and of the uses of land as would tend to create conditions favorable to health, safety, transportation, prosperity, protection of property, civic activity, and recreational, educational, and cultural opportunities, and as would tend to further economy and efficiency in the supply of public services. Such regulations shall be made with reasonable consideration, among other things, of the character of the respective districts and their suitability for the uses provided in the regulations, and with a view to encouraging stability of districts and of land values therein.