  Recent results of meson photo-production at the existing electron machines
with polarized real photon beams and the measurement of polarization
observables of the final state baryons have provided high precision data that
led to the discovery of new excited nucleon and $\Delta$ states using
multi-channel partial wave analyses procedures. The internal structure of
several prominent excited states has been revealed employing meson
electroproduction processes. On the theoretical front, lattice QCD is now
predicting the baryon spectrum with very similar characteristics as the
constituent quark model, and continuum QCD, such as is represented in the
Dyson-Schwinger Equations approach and in light front relativistic quark
models, describes the non-perturbative behavior of resonance excitations at
photon virtuality of $Q^2 > 1.5GeV^2$. In this talk I discuss the need to
continue a vigorous program of nucleon spectroscopy and the study of the
internal structure of excited states as a way to reveal the effective degrees
of freedom underlying the excited states and their dependence on the distance
scale probed.
