Abilene weekly reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1888-1935, 1889-01-24
Communicated
Some Reflections from a Farmer,

Some Reflections from a Farmer,
EDITOR OF THE REFLECTOR:-Witf
your permission / would like 10 Offel
some reflections on the conditions o.
the producing classes in the past, pres
ent and future.
There has been much said and writer
in the past Few years about the wage
worker. There have been strikes innum
cradle; there have been Congressional
| Investigations, arbitratiOns, lockouts
etc., but not a word for the farmer and
producer. 1t is an undeniable fact
that farm property. as well as farms
have deprecated in value in the last
four years; that farmers, as class, are
no better off than they were four years
since, more especially in the West
while thousands are on the verge OF
bankruptcy. 1t is useless to try to
conceal these facts. Ask of the first
| ten farmers you meet if this statement
is not so and nine of them will tell you
it is true. Is it not the part of wisdom
to discover the cause or causes of this
condition of things and speedily seek
for remedy?
This state of affairs is not attribute
bic to lack of energy or enterprise,
for there is no class of laborers who
labor more hours in day than do the
producing classes. 1t cannot be attrib-
uted to extravagant living, for no class
of people live so economically as the
farmers. 1t cannot be attributed to
speculations, for, as a class, they do
not speculate. Then what is the cause?
L will try to present the cause as well
as remedy as it appears to me.
If you will refer to March Sd, 1888.
you will find that quite reduction of
the tariff on wool was made. We have
now had six years. experience of man.
ufacturers buying wool in the markets
of the world. Hundreds of millions Of
pounds of wool have been imported into
this country that could have been
raised here and would have been, had
the wool been protected. What has
been the result? Kansas had in 1881
twelve hundred thousand sheep. The
advance sheets of the State Board of
Agriculture for 1883 show that We have
only four hundred and two thousand,
two-thirds of that vast amount of
wealth is destroyed; and what is true
of Kansas is true of every State to
greater or less extent.
In 1888, there were imported into
this country about twenty million
pounds of raw wool to say nothing of
manufactured goods.
If that wool had been raised here it
would have added about thirty million
dollars to the profits of the wool grow
ers. The men who have been driven
from wool growing have engaged in the
raising of cattle, hogs, corn and other
farm products, thus largely increasing
the amount of these products.
Now if there was any question de-
cided in the recent presidential contest
it was this one thing. that Americans
demand protection for every form of
industry. Then the duty of the hour
is to levy such tariff on wool that it
will practically exclude foreign wool
FROM our markets. This would give
such an impetus to the wool business
that in five years those hideOus mort
cages would disappear like mist before |
the rising sun.
But there is another hydra-headed |
that has got his poisonous
fangs on the people of the United States
and is rapidly crushing; the life out Of
the people. 1 refer to the dressed beef
The facts are that four
Or five men control the beef and pork
market of this country so that they can
lower the price of beef to the producer
andlraise the price to tie consumer at
heir own sweet will. Where are the
,attle men of Dickinson county who
i've years since we're making money?
Zone where the woOdbine twineth.
Why has the price of beef cattle stead
ly declined and the price of beef in
be East gone almost up to war times?
Because the tbig four" choose to have
do so and there Is no one to modest
T make afraid. These age the facts
hat confront u.s. There is not dollar
q the cattle business over abare living; Il
heep husbandry is worse, and "whatIi