1956: Eisenhower Reply to Albright

In response to Horace Albright's letter, President Eisenhower echoed Albright's support for a non-partisan conservation agenda. Ironically, it took just one day for the Republican National Committee to release the Eisenhower-Albright correspondence to the public. Eisenhower went on to win reelection in a landslide over Adlai Stevenson

Dated November 2, 1956, Eisenhower's response reads:

Dear Mr. Albright:

I was gratified indeed to receive your letter and the assurance it contained about the merits of the conservation programs of this Administration. I was brought up close to the soil of the State of Kansas, and my boyhood experiences taught me many of the principles of true conservation. Our present programs have objectives which are in the interest of all of our people and are founded on principles which ought not to be the basis of partisan politics.

In every Department associated with the problems of soil and water, and of renewable resources, we have recommended programs designed in our best judgment to promote the objective so earnestly advocated by Gifford Pinchot -- namely, to insure that both the use and conservation of natural resources should promote the greatest good for the greatest number.

Your commendation of the conservation programs we have established is all the more reassuring in the light of your long and eminent leadership in a cause as important to the present and future generations of Americans.

Sincerely,

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Source:

Record of Correspondence released by The Republican National Committee, November 3, 1956.