| Book Review | Environmental History, 10.1

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| Book Review | Environmental History, 10.1 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Jack Ward Thomas: The Journals of a Forest Service Chief. Edited by Harold K. Steen. Durham, N.C.: Forest History Society, in association with the University of Washington Press, 2004. 417 pp. Illustrations, notes, index. $30.00.
Jack Ward Thomas's journals came to hand as we watched the 2004 presidential election from Berlin. In a profound sense, these writings unfold the public-resource side of the Republican resurgence in the West that led, in part, to the outcome of the election.	1
Unlike those journals whose authors simply report events, Thomas's writings are most valuable because they reveal his thoughts. His ruminations derive from the views of a scientist who believes that land managers should base their prescriptions on the best scientific investigations available. In this connection, the diaries reveal that he found himself constantly frustrated because of the Clinton administration's tendency to forget science in order to satisfy environmentalists, the tendency of aggressive and uninformed Republicans to advocate intensive commodity extraction, and the abdication of responsibility by Democratic legislators.	2
In reflecting on these events, Thomas saw that the Republicans had succeeded in selling their agenda, especially after 1994. Their success, he said, quoting former House Speaker Tip O'Neill, occurred because they understood that "All things are political and all politics is local" (p. 265).	. . .

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