Southern standard. (McMinnville, Tenn.) 1879-current, 1891-09-12

find one selling for this price you will
find twenty selling for less than
cents. Can Congress pass any law
that will make cent beef sell for 81
cents. have neighbor making
and selling all his butter ut 20 cents
per pound, while ten others are sells
ing ut from 10 to 10 cents. Can Con-
gress pass any law that will make 10
cent butter bring % cents? | have
another neighbor who is cultivating
a field in corn that | have known as
far back as / can recOllect, and ] feel |
safe in saying it has never in my re-
collection produced barrels of corn
per acre, and will not this year, with
all the rain and labor necessary for a
good crop, yield 3 barrels per acre.
Can Congress pass any law that will
make such land produce good
crops?
If the law cannot change this, who
but the farmer can change it?
Now as to the trusts and combines
of which we have heard so much of
late years. Are we not buying oil
% to 80 per cent. cheaper now than
we did before the oil trust was form
ed. Now please tell me how the oil
trust has injured the farmer? /
bought wire for the first fence | made
from Scutt & Co., manufacturers, at
Pittsburgh 6 cents per pound. This
was before the wire trust was formed.
Now l can buy it for cents. How
is the farmer injured by this COM
bine?
Mr.. Armour, in his statement be-
fore the U. S. Senate committee i'm
1888 in reference to the present beef
trust claimed that his average profits
on $40, $40 head of cattle was 81. 25 per
head. A sum less than a farmer
realizes on 80 dozen eggs; and yet Mr..
Armour made about half million
dollars by concentrating large
amount of capital, labor and ma
chinery in small compass, a thing
the farmer cannot expect to do, al
though his capital may be made to
yield larger per cent.
Mr.. Blackstone, president of the
Chicago q Alton railroad, stated in
1889 that of $50 railroad companies
in the United States, only SO paid
dividends. Nine paid 10 per cent,
Z paid s per cent, "a paid 6 per cent,
and the remaining 10 from l to per
cent.
Are we not buying our goods
cheaper than ever before Are we
not buying our wagons, mowers and
binders at about one half we paid fol
them few years ago. might add
much more along this line, but
deem this sufficient to show you tina
= the tendency in all departments o
: human industry is towards cheape
: production, and that unless the far
. mer keeps up in the changing orde
: of things he will be left. There i
{ no good reason why the farme
: should expect TO buy what he con
l. sumes at a much reduced price with
e out corresponding reduction in tn
price of what he has to sell. thin
y the facts will bear me in saying tn
u farm, when judiciously managed, wi
10 pay a greater rate of interest on
&c limited capital than almost any oth6
y pursuit. Although it will not adm
10 of such concentration of capital, labC
le and machinery as some other pu
~ suits where large fortunes are SOM
III times made. l see too many ia
j. mers with nice buggies, driving GOO
u horses and wearing good clothes
40 believe they are an oppressed elias
III hedged in on all sides by combint
L ton seeking their degradation. Il
III farmers who believe this, move
y! town and buy what they consume c
Va the farm, and then think such wi
III appreciate the farm.
a. BY way of encouragement allo
81 me to state that we have in N
IL neighborhoOd a young man wi
w commenced business for himself {
10 the farm nine years ago with caI
1t tai sof $4,000 He has since tn
u time paid $4,000 on $1,000 farr
eo and to meet the remaining 81, 400
" has 1000 bushels of wheat, % hel
H. of good beef cattle, with other sto
Oh sufficient to liquidate the de
eS' and leave him more than he cor
le' menced with. And this has all be
ny done on the farm. The only tradi
'ur he has done has been in stock 10 CO
~ sumo the products of the farm.
lie Another matter demanding serio
lOt consideration is the prejudice III