(editor'snote)

In Midtown Manhattan, among the last bastions of unabashed progressivism, two well-dressed men in suits were recently having a spirited debate about the environment. "But what about our grandchildren?" one asked. "That's their problem," the other shot back.

This true story pretty much sums up the green zeitgeist of these troubled times.

Environmental victories amount to preserving the status quo—such as keeping the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge safe from drilling—rather than achieving concrete gains.

Theodore Roosevelt might be slamming his big stick from the grave watching the liquidation of the national forests he established a century ago to safeguard "our well-being," as he declared in his first message to Congress. The Clinton administration, at the tail end of its term, made a last-ditch effort to keep some of the few remaining unprotected roadless areas of national forests out of harm's way. The Bush administration prefers to exploit them for timber, gas, and other commodities.

For this issue, Audubon assigned six eminent photographers to document six national forests at stake, most for the first time in any publication. Their stunning, unforgettable images challenge us with lightning-bolt intensity to preserve these places for posterity. Losing them would be tantamount to losing the heath hen Lewis and Clark recorded 200 years ago. Future generations would surely condemn our short-term folly, as we condemn the reckless buffalo and whale hunters of the past. While we now have laws to avert species extinctions, the strength of those laws lies in their strict enforcement.

On the heels of Lewis and Clark's journey, writers, poets, and painters set out on patriotic and spiritual missions to save nature by glorifying it. In 1849 Asher B. Durand, a leader of the Hudson River School, painted "Kindred Spirits." Art historians consider it the classic celebration of man communing with nature and God. Today, 154 years later, the photo of Tahoe National Forest by Keoki Flagg on this issue's cover exalts the same sentiment.

But you don't have to be a poet or a painter—or even a conservationist—to appreciate the pragmatic reasons for taking care of our national forests. After all, their creation was a response to public outcry over damaged watersheds. Today these forests provide this country's single biggest source of drinking water. And life without them would be our problem.