Bismarck weekly tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1943, 1893-08-11

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the week, both foreign andlocal; published every
Friday, sent postage paid to any address, for one
year ~; six months, 81; three months. IS cents.
THE LOT OF A FARMER.
Probably no state in the union is 90
we'll prepared to stand the financial de-
preston as North Dakota. Her pro-
ducts are readily convertible into cash.
The wheat and cattle market may be of,
but at some figure the North Dakota
farmer can dispose of his products. We
have no manufactures shutting down
and throwing thousands of men out of
work to starve, beg, or steal. IL the
average eastern city t%wo-thirds of the
people are struggling for mere existence.
A. laborer thrown out of work, or sick
for a month in a city is, to use a vulgar
phrase, ION his uppers." Having nothing
IN sight he has no credit. The North
Dakota farmer does not realize his adj
van1agss over hundreds OF thousands of
his fellow men. He has, if he is reason
ably frugal, a sure thing on a living,
eSUu LIS slCdlCS Sul6S uuS USCu II S1COlS
Credit has made the North Dakota
farmer to much of a Spectator. Ex-
elusive wheat raising is speculation of
the rankest sort: it is not legitimate farm
ing. The farmer must buy his expert
ence the same as the merchant or profess
sional man. Many of the latter class
fail because they are not fitted up for
their chosen profession, Hundreds of
farmers fail because they know nothing
about farming. There can never be
the diversity in North Dakota farming
that there is in old New England or the
middle states but the agriculturists of
this state will find, after experience more
or less expensive to themselves and the
state at large, that in order to prosper
they must diversity as much as the
climate, the soil and the conditions of
nature in the northwest will permit. No
legislation can make a wheat raiser
prosper in the face Of low prices and
low prices must prevail when three
bushels of grain is raised where only two
bushels are consumed.
In Chicago to-day there are over 20O,-
600 unemployed men according TO Mayor
Harrison, and what is true of Chicago is
true Of other large cities. The North
Dakota farmer has many just causes of
complaint, but he should stop and con-
slider the fact that the merchant who
extends him credit for goods, the ma
chine man who sells him a binder on
time, exact no more interest from him
than is exacted from the tradesman, and
after all the farmers ills are no..more
numerous than countless thousands Of
his fellow citizens. The farmer should
remember that old maxim that "all is
not gold that glitters," and much that
seems to him to be luxury and comfort
is, after all, mockery, worry and strife.
In line with this thought the following
from the Jamestown Alert, one of the
most persistent of populist champions,
is to the point:
1t is understood that a good many
merchants Of the state are being compelled
to abandon the credit system and sell only
for cash. The present inability of the
wholesale houses to carry the country mer-
chant as heretofore, in large lines of credit,
is forcing the retail dealer to require cash
of the farmers. 1t is said that at no other
time in the history of the state has the
pressure for cash basis been so great, and
that all merchants are compelled to act
alike.
Farmers have in the past relied too much
on the country merchant for food supplies
which could be raised on the farm. Instead
of selling for cash or exchanging for gro.
ceries. dry goods, etc., such farm products
as butter. eggs, cheese, calves, pigs, poul-
try, ETC., these articles have TOO often been
bought at the counters of the country mer-
chant or country meat market. The reverse
Of this will have to come to pass before
either the merchant can be sure of his bills
or the farmer can have the certainty Of
meeting them.
There is one thing that a North Dakota
farm will do for an industrious. careful
man and his family-it will insure him a
living in any kind of a season, if not riches
and ~luxuries. In such times as these when
thousands of honest Woodworking men are
already out of work, and a greater number
are fearful of being thrown completely out
OF the opportunity to earn a living, the
North Dakota farmer ought to feel content.
un~,Dv NJ rX.,c o. NJ No., Wi. l,.~l.