Progressives viewed the Ballinger-Pinchot affair as a sign that President Taft?

The Pinchotâ??Ballinger controversy was a dispute between the U. S. Forest Service Chief Gifford Pinchot and U. S. Secretary of the Interior Richard Achilles Ballinger. Because President Taft appointed Ballinger to head the Department of the Interior, progressives viewed him as unsupportive to the conservation movement, unlike his predecessor, Theodore Roosevelt.