The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1872-11-29
EDWARD DANIELS, Editor and Manager.
FRIDAY EvEG, NOV. 20, 1872
TnE FARMERS, CONVENTION.

We are glad to see the farmers Of the |
State moving in the matter of an organiza-
ton to insure the better protection of their
interests as class, and for the advance
ment Of agricultural industry in Virginia.
The Convention now sitting in Petersburg,
composed Tor designed to bel of the farm
ors of this State aud of North Carolina,
have projected the form of an organization
which may, and We trust will, be of great
advantage to our State. Almost every
other great industrial interest in the coun-
try has its representative organization look
ing to the advancement of its material
prosperity, and many of these are more or
less antagonistic, in their special tendencies,
to the agricultural interest. Some of these
organizations are powerful and compact
bodies, welding immense resources, and
designed in measure to control the prices
Of agricultural staples, at the same time
that they FIX the prices of their own mate
rial products, and it behooves the agricul-
tural interest to counter on these move
ments, that the chief and most important
industry of the country may not suffer in
competition with others.
But while we are glad to see this move
nent on the part Of our farmers, and expe-
cially commend the spirit which has prompt
ed it, we can but regret that a wiser and
more sagacious policy should not have gov
erned their councils than that looking TO a
union Of the mercantile and agricultural in
t2rests in one organized body. AS long as
merchants have their separate aud indie
pendent boards of trade. chambers of
commerce, corn and other exchanges, with
view to furthering their own interests at
the expense Of the agricultural industry Of
the State, there is every reason why the
door to our agricultural organizations
should be closed against them. The farm
er bringing his products to this city must
conform to the strict rules and regulations
OF these commercial boards, and why
should he not have just as independent and
exclusive an organization as those secured
to the mercantile classes? 1t certainly
cannot be that the farmers OF Virginia lack
the intelligence to properly organize pro-
tectiye league for themselves and there is
no more reason why they should adj
NIT the mercantile classes to their coun-
ellis, to aid in shaping their individual poll
cy, than the manufacturing classes, or any
other class that may be named.
All these classes have their separate or
CARNATIONS through which they shape their
respective policies as to general dealing and
trade, and to open the door for any one Of
them to shape the agricultural policy, is
simply blunder, which time will have to
rectify after the stupidity ofthe act is made
manifest to the agricultural interest.
Aside from this and some other excep.
tienal features in the proceedings of the
Convention now in session at Petersburg,
the movement has our cordial approval and
VIII receive our earnest support. No body
OF men in the State can command larger
interest, or bring a greater amount of intel
ligence into organized activity among
them, than the farmers of Virginia.
They have no occasion, therefore, to go
outside for aid in organizing any movement
they may seek to set on foot. An agricul-
tural convention will have its chief value,
whenever and wherever held, in the fact
that it is composed entirely of agricultu-
rists, as mercantile conventions have theirs
in the fact that the leading merchants ofthe
State exclusively take part in them.