Presidential addresses and state papers, Volume 2 (of 7)Roosevelt, Theodore
History
Presidential addresses and state papers, Volume 2 (of 7)
Roosevelt, Theodore
Roosevelt, Theodore, 1858-1919; United States -- Politics and government -- 1901-1909
more than one State must come under the Federal Government. Many of
the great tracts which will ultimately so enlarge the cultivated
area of Utah, which will ultimately so increase its population and
wealth, are surrounded with intricate complications because of the
high development which irrigation has already reached in this State.
Necessarily the Federal officers charged with the execution of the law
must proceed with great caution so as not to disturb present vested
rights; but subject to that, they will go forward as fast as they
can. They realize, and all men who have actually done irrigating here
will realize, that no man is more timid than the practical irrigator
regarding any change in the water distribution. He wants to look
well before he leaps. He has learned from bitter experience what
damage can come from well meant changes hastily made. The government
can do a good deal; the government will do a good deal; but your
experience here in Utah has shown that the greatest results which
are accomplishing most spring directly from the sturdy courage, the
self-denial, the willingness with iron resolution to endure the risk
and the suffering, of the pioneers; for they were the men who sought
and found a livelihood in what was once a desert, and they must be
protected in the legitimate fruits of their toil.
One of the tasks that the government must do here in Utah is to build
reservoirs for the storage of the flood waters, to undertake works
too great to be undertaken by private capital. Great as the task is,
and great as its benefits will become, the government must do still
more. Besides the storage of the water there must be protection of the
watersheds; and that is why I ask you to help the National Government
protect the watersheds by protecting the forests upon them.
AT FREEPORT, ILL., JUNE 3, 1903
_Congressman Hitt, and you, my Fellow-Countrymen_:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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