Pinchot–Ballinger controversy

In 1909 he became convinced that Ballinger was reversing the last-minute moves by outgoing President Roosevelt to block big business from gaining control of any major water sources.

In August, 1909, speaking at the annual meeting of the National Irrigation Congress in Spokane, Washington, he accused Ballinger of siding with private trusts in his handling of water power issues.

Glavis received a sympathetic response from Alexander Shaw, Overton Price and Pinchot, who helped him to prepare the presentation for Taft.

Pinchot and Glavis presented Taft with a 50-page report accusing Ballinger of an improper interest in his handling of coal field claims in Alaska.

Glavis said that Ballinger first as commissioner of the General Land Office, and then as Secretary of the Interior, had tried to stop investigations of coal claim purchases made by Clarence Cunningham.

Taft consulted with Attorney General George Wickersham before issuing a public letter in September, exonerating Ballinger and authorizing the dismissal of Glavis on grounds of insubordination.

In November, Collier's Weekly published an article elaborating his allegations, entitled The Whitewashing of Ballinger: Are the Guggenheims in Charge of the Department of the Interior?

Ballinger was cleared of any wrongdoing, Nevertheless he was criticized from some quarters with the accusation that he favored private enterprise and the exploitation of natural resources over conservationism.

[7] Henry F. Pringle, in his 1939 biography of Taft, portrayed Ballinger as an innocent victim of vindictive Roosevelt loyalists and of yellow journalism that gave their accusations velocity:An examination of thousands of pages of evidence can lead the impartial reader only to the conclusion that Ballinger was the victim of an attack fostered by fanaticism and nurtured by bad journalism.