Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
The Pinchot-Muir Split
Revisited
Society of American Foresters
National Convention
Portland, Oregon, October 26, 2007
Moderator:
Barry Walsh
Reading for Gifford Pinchot:
Edward Barnard
Reading for John Muir:
John Nesbitt
The writings of Gifford Pinchot and
John Muir document their differences and
similarities that converge today in a land ethic.
Hetch Hetchy Valley, Yosemite National Park, symbol of the Pinchot-Muir Split.
Top, early 1900s. Above, 2007, as rendered on the California Sierra Club website.
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
Many good people believe
that alligators were created
by the Devil, thus accounting for their all-consuming
appetite and ugliness….
From the dust of the earth,
from the common elementary fund, the Creator has
made Homo sapiens. From
the same material he has
made every other creature,
however noxious and insignificant to us. They are
earth-born companions and
our fellow mortals.
--John Muir Journal, 1867
John Muir, 1872
(1838-1914)
Gifford Pinchot, 1870s
(1865-1946)
Bees are very useful
creatures. They are
useful because of the
honey and wax which
they
produce
and
which are important
articles in commerce.
Wasps and hornets are
their bitterest enemies.
It has been said that
bees have been deceived by embroidered
flowers and also by
pictures, but I believe
that this is all bosh.
--GP Diary, 1880
Preservation vs. Utilitarianism: Foreshadowing the Split
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
Muir on Sargent: In 1893,
R.U. Johnson of Century
Magazine, a publisher of
Muir writings, introduced
the naturalist to Charles S.
Sargent, first director of the
Arnold Arboretum at Harvard University. Muir was a
houseguest at the Brookline
estate, where Sargent was
working on his 14-volume
Silva of North America. Together they made botanical
explorations, from Alaska to
Florida, for the Silva.
Sargent on Muir: Sargent
dedicated vol. 11 of the Silva
to his friend John Muir.
--James Mitchell Clarke
In 1896,
Brandis penned a 20-page letter to GP outlining “the essentials of a government forest
service” stressing “esprit de
corps and professionalism….
Not only the unequaled morale
of the Forest Service but also
the existence of the Society of
American Foresters may have
their points of departure in that
remarkable letter.”
Pinchot on Sargent: As first
head of the N.Y. State Forest
Commission, Sargent saw to it
that “lands now or hereafter
constituting the forest preserve
shall be forever kept as wild
forestland.”
--GP
Pinchot on Brandis:
John Muir & Gifford Pinchot, 1890
Charles Sprague Sargent
1841-1927
Sir Dietrich Brandis
1824-1907
John Muir, Gifford Pinchot, and Their Mentors
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
“By sail, saddle, mule, carriage, ranch wagon, river
boat, and their own feet,
the commissioners traveled
northwestward from the
Black Hills, across Wyoming to the Big Horn Mountains, to the Flathead Reserve in Montana, the Cascade Range of Washington
and Oregon, down 400 miles
of the Sierra Nevada, and on
to the Grand Canyon….it
was a journey of everchanging delights, which
made the areas of wanton
destruction all the more
sickening.”
--Muir
John Muir & Gifford Pinchot, 1890s
“…I met the Commission—
Sargent, Brewer, Hague, and
Abbot—at Belton, Montana,
on July 16 [1896]. To my
great delight, John Muir was
with them. In his late fifties,
tall, thin, cordial, and a most
fascinating talker, I took to
him at once. It amazed me to
learn that he never carried
even a fishhook with him on
his solitary explorations. He
said fishing wasted too much
time….when we came across
a tarantula [at the Grand Canyon], he wouldn’t let me kill
it. He said it had as much right
there as we did.”
--GP
1896 National Forest Commission Tour of the West
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
In August 1897, in a
Seattle hotel lobby, Muir
encountered Pinchot, after
reading in a newspaper
Pinchot’s statement that
sheep did no harm in the
mountains where they were
taken to graze.
Muir strode up to Pinchot
with his finger marking the
offending item, “Have they
quoted you correctly here?
…Then, I don’t want any
more to do with you. Last
summer when we were in
the Cascades you agreed
that sheep do a great deal of
harm!”
--Muir
John Muir & Gifford Pinchot, 1897
“In the early days of the
grazing trouble, when the
protection of the public timberlands was a live political
issue, we were faced with
this simple choice: Shut out
all grazing and lose the Forest Reserves, or let stock in
under control and save the
Reserves....when strictly limited and controlled…grazing
can go on without great harm
to the forests….” In 1900 in
Arizona when GP saw sheep
eating and trampling seedlings, he wrote: “John Muir
called them hoofed locusts,
and he was right.”
--GP
Public Feud over Sheep Grazing on Forest Reserves
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
Muir, Emerson, and Transcendentalism: In his student
days, Muir found Thoreau
“particularly congenial,” and
the poet-philosopher Emerson “affected him greatly”. In
1871, introduced by friends,
Emerson visited Muir at the
Yosemite sawmill that Muir
was managing. Emerson
favored Muir’s methods of
striving for excellence: “He
relied on himself trusting to
the impulses that came to
him in the best moments, and
he fostered these impulses by
studying nature, the finest of
men, and the finest in Man.”
--James Mitchell Clarke
John Muir 1902
Gifford Pinchot 1900
Ralph Waldo Emerson
1803-1882
Charles Sanders Peirce
1839-1914
Pinchot, Peirce, and Pragmatism: The scientist-philosopher
Peirce and his wife were cardplaying friends of GP’s parents
at Grey Towers. As a housewarming gift, Peirce presented
the Pinchots with an antique
sundial that GP’s father attached as a clock to the stone entrance tower. Peirce’s pragmatism linked the meaning of concepts to their practical consequences. GP, though known as
a practical man, also was influenced by the writings of the
transcendentalist and mysticspiritualist Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772).
--Pinchot Diaries, 1890s
Muir, Pinchot, and Their Favorite Philosophers
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
“Of all the great builders—the
famous doers of things in this
busy world—none that I know
of more ably and manfully did
his appointed work than my
friend Edward Henry Harriman
.…He fairly reveled in heavy
dynamical work and went about
it naturally and unweariedly like
glaciers making landscapes, cutting canyons through ridges,
carrying off hills, laying rails
and bridges over lakes and rivers, mountains and plains, making the nation’s ways straight
and smooth and safe, bringing
everybody nearer to one another.”
--John Muir
Eulogy for E.H. Harriman
John Muir
1907
E.H. Harriman
1848-1909
Gifford Pinchot
1906
James J. Hill
1838-1916
At the 1905 American Forest
Congress, James J. Hill, president of the Great Northern
Railway, was among the “new
recruits” Pinchot “won over to
our side”. At the 1908 Governors’ Conference, Hill was “among five outstanding citizens chosen to represent the
people of the United States.”
Held at the White House and
chaired by Pinchot, the conference took up the topic of conservation. Theodore Roosevelt
then named Hill to the
National Conservation Commission, Section on Lands.
--Gifford Pinchot
Breaking New Ground
Muir, Pinchot, and Their Favorite Railroad Tycoons
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
Muir and T.R.: In 1903
Muir and T.R. camped
for three nights together
at Yosemite, where Muir
torched a dead pine and
made his case for
government preservation
of wilderness areas.
T.R. and Muir: T.R.
then pushed Congress to
create five new national
parks and to pass the
Monuments and Antiquities Act allowing him
to proclaim and preserve
the Grand Canyon and
22 other national monuments.
--James M. Clarke Theodore Roosevelt and
Life & Adventures of John Muir
John Muir, Yosemite, 1903
TR and Gifford Pinchot
Mississippi River, 1907
Pinchot and Roosevelt:
“Launching the Conservation movement was the
most significant achievement of the T.R. Administration, as he himself
believed. It seems altogether probable that it will
also be the achievement
for which he will be longest and most gratefully
remembered.
--GP, Breaking New Ground
T.R. on Pinchot:
“In all forestry matters, I
have put my conscience
in the keeping of Gifford
Pinchot.”
--R.U. Johnson
Remembered Yesterdays
Muir, Pinchot, and Their Favorite U.S. President
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
Muir and Preservation: On
June 4, 1892, twenty-seven
men signed papers creating
the Sierra Club “to explore,
enjoy, and render accessible
the mountain regions of the
Pacific Coast; to publish authentic information concerning them; and to enlist the
support and cooperation of
the people and the government in preserving the forests and other natural features of the Sierra Nevada
Mountains…They proceeded then to elect John Muir
Sierra Club president, an
office he held for 22 years.
--James M. Clarke, 1980
John Muir 1902
Pinchot and Conservation:
“The first great fact about
conservation is that it stands
for development. There has
been a fundamental misconception that conservation
means nothing but the husbanding of resources for future generations.
--GP, 1910
WJ McGee “defined the new
Gifford Pinchot, 1907 policy as the use of the natural resources for the greatest
good of the greatest number
for the longest time.” Overton
Price “proposed that we apply
a new meaning to a word
already in the dictionary, and
christen the new policy Conservation.”
--GP, 1946
Preservation vs. Conservation: Defining Terms
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
Muir was not invited to the
widely publicized “Conservation Conference” called by
T.R. It was Pinchot’s show.
Only Charles Evans Hughes,
Governor of New York…and
Dr. J. Horace McFarland,
president of the American
Civic Assn., spoke for preservation of parts of America
in their natural state. Muir
probably could not have
attended had he been invited.
He was confined to home
much of the time by exhaustion complicated by his
racking bronchial cough and
savage migraine headaches.
John Muir & Gifford Pinchot, ca. 1908
“The Governors’ Conference put Conservation in a
firm place in the knowledge
and thinking of the people.
From that moment it became
an inseparable part of the
national policy of the United
States…. Conservation was
universally accepted until
it began to be applied….
From that day to this, men
and interests who had a
money reason for doing so
have fought Conservation
with bitterness, and in many
cases with success. That war
is raging still, and it is yet
very far from being won.”
--James Mitchell Clarke
1908 Conference of Governors on Conservation
--GP
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
Muir on Hetch Hetchy:
…the Phelans, Pinchots
and their hirelings will
not thrive forever….
These temple-destroyers,
devotees of ravaging
commercialism, seem to
have a perfect contempt
for Nature, and instead of
lifting their eyes to the
God of the mountains, lift
them to the Almighty
Dollar. Dam Hetch Hetchy! As well dam for
water-tanks the people's
cathedrals and churches,
for no holier temple has
ever been consecrated by
the heart of man.
John Muir & Gifford Pinchot, ca. 1913
Pinchot on Hetch Hetchy:
The star witness in 1913
hearings on legislation to
dam Hetch Hetchy to provide water and hydropower
for San Francisco, Gifford
Pinchot testified: “If we had
nothing else to consider
then the delight of the few
men and women who would
yearly go to Hetch Hetchy
Valley, then it should be
left in its natural condition.
But the considerations on
the other side of the
question, to my mind, are
simply overwhelming…. I
never understood Muir’s
position on Hetch Hetchy.”
Hetch Hetchy: Mother of All Environmental Debates
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
Aldo Leopold, a pupil of
Gifford Pinchot at the Yale
Forest School, attended
summer school at Grey
Towers. He graduated in
1909 with a masters in forestry, and GP hired him at
the U.S. Forest Service.
Wilderness and wolves on
the Gila National Forest
inspired Leopold to propose roadless areas and to
formulate a land ethic. A
Univ. of Wisconsin professor and “father of wildlife
management”, he served
as a Journal of Forestry
editor and was a founder
of the Wilderness Society.
(self portrait)
1838-1914
Aldo Leopold
1887-1948
The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries
of the community to include soils, waters,
plants and animals, or collectively: the land.
A land ethic, then, reflects the existence of an
ecological conscience, and this in turn
reflects a conviction of individual responsibility for the health of the land. Health is the
capacity of the land for self-renewal.
Conservation is our effort to understand and
preserve this capacity.
(newspaper sketch)
1865-1946
It is inconceivable to me that an ethical relation
to land can exist without love, respect, and
admiration for land, and a high regard for its
value. By value, I of course mean something
far broader than mere economic value; I mean
value in the philosophical sense. A thing is
right when it tends to preserve the integrity,
stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It
is wrong when it tends other-wise.
--Aldo Leopold, Journal of Forestry, 1933
Converging Philosophies and a Land Ethic
Society of American Foresters - F5 Philosophy and History Working Group
Credits
Title page: Hetch Hetchy Valley, early 1900s, and Restore
Hetch Hetchy, 2007, www.california.sierraclub.org/hetchhetchy.
Preservation vs. Utilitarianism: Foreshadowing the Split:
Muir text, John Muir, A Thousand Mile Walk to the Gulf, Boston:
Houghton Mifflin, 1916; photo, Bradley & Rulofson/ Bancroft
Library Collection. Pinchot text, LOC Manuscript Div.; photo,
USFS Grey Towers, National Historic Site.
Muir, Pinchot, and Their Mentors: Muir text, J.M. Clarke, The
Life and Adventures of John Muir, Sierra Club Books, 1980;
photo, The Sierra Club. Pinchot text, Gifford Pinchot, Breaking
New Ground, Harcourt Brace, 1947; photo, USFS, Grey Towers,
NHS. Sargent photo, LC-USZ62-102331. Brandis photo, USFS.
1896 National Forest Commission Tour of the West: Muir
text, John Muir, “The American Forests”, Atlantic Monthly No.
80, 1897; photo, U.S. National Park Service. Pinchot text,
Breaking New Ground; photo, USFS.
Public Feud over Sheep Grazing on Forest Reserves: Muir
text, Linnie Marsh Wolfe, Son of the Wilderness: The Life of
John Muir, New York: A.A. Knopf, 1945; photo, U.S. National
Park Service. Pinchot text, Breaking New Ground; photo, USFS
LC-USZ62-107389.
Muir, Pinchot, and Their Favorite Philosophers: Muir text,
Life and Adventures of John Muir; photo, F.F. Fritz/The Sierra
Club. Pinchot text, Pinchot diaries; photo, USFS. Emerson, S.W.
Rouse/LC-DIG-ppmsca-07398. Peirce photo, U.S. Gov.
Muir, Pinchot, and Their Favorite Railroad Tycoons: Muir text,
J. Muir, Edward Henry Harriman, Garden City, NY: Doubleday,
1911. Pinchot text, Breaking New Ground, photo, USFS. Photos:
Harriman LC-DIG-ggbain-00683; Hill www.crk.umn.edu.
Muir, Pinchot, and Their Favorite U.S. President: Muir text,
Life & Adventures of John Muir. Pinchot text, R.U. Johnson,
Remembered Yesterday, Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1923. MuirTR photo, Underwood & Underwood/LC-USZ62-107389. GP-TR
photo, USFS/LC-USZ62-107389.
Preservation vs. Conservation: Defining Terms: Muir text, Life
and Adventures of John Muir; photo, The Sierra Club. GP text, The
Fight for Conservation, 1910; Breaking New Ground, 1947; photo,
USFS.
1908 Conference of Governors on Conservation: Muir text, Life
and Adventures of John Muir; photo, The Sierra Club; Pinchot text,
Breaking New Ground; photo, USFS.
Hetch Hetchy: Mother of All Environmental Debates: Muir
text, William F. Badè, The Life and Letters of John Muir, 1924;
John Muir, The Yosemite, 1912; photo, The Sierra Club. Pinchot
text, Congressional Record; photo, USFS Grey Towers, NHS.
Converging Philosophies and a Land Ethic: Leopold text, Aldo
Leopold, “The Conservation Ethic.” Journal of Forestry 31(6): 634643 (1933); photo, www.ecotopia.org/ehof/leopold.