The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1894-03-28
MORTGAGES ON FARMS AND HOME
Statistics Showing Falsity of Certain Popu
list Orators Pet Phrases.
New York SUM-

A stock phrase with all Populist ora
tors and Farmers Alliance platform
builders is "the debt-burdened homes
ant farms of the people" loaded down
by mortgages aggregating nearly three
billion dollars. According to these ora
tors the agricultural portions of the
United States are owned, pretty gen.
orally, by Eastern or alien money lend
ers, who exact from the tillers of the
soil nearly usurious interest, which is
rapidly draining out the profits of the
farmers, and extending constantly the
area of mortgaged lands. Against this
state of things the Populist orators Wig
orously and continuously protest.
There are 4,650,000 farms in the
United States. Ore-quarter of the
farms in the United States are mort
gagged; three-quarters of the farms are
owned free of enculnbrance. The total
mortgage debt resting upon the farms
of the country is not "nearly three bill
lion dollars" but is actually s., ,04O, ,O0O,-
600. The mortgages on farms are just
about one-half in value of the mort
cages on city and town lots, and are
increasing in much smaller ratio. The
mortgage debt on all land, city and
town lots as we'll as farms, amounts to
SllO per capita, which is less than the
national debt per capita of France, sis,
or Peru, Sl45. The per capita debt of
Holland is s95, of England sS7; of Italy
S76, of Spain S73 and of the United
States sl4. Mortgages upon farming
lands are always an incident of pro-
gress in newly developing countries
and, are, practically, one of the neces-
sites of development. A farmer open
ing up new land requires many things
which cannot be bought on credit at
distance, to secure which be mortgages
his land, the productiveness of which
is enhanced by the articles which the
proceeds of the mortgage enable him to
buy.
Kansas stands at the head of the
States the land of which is heavily
The total in the State is
Sl70 per capita. In Minnesota it is sl52,
in Massachusetts, Sl44, and in Nebras-
ka SIPS, but the total in Massachusetts
is greatly increased, of course, by the
mortgaged debts of Boston and other
large cities. Outside of these the mort
cages are no heavier than in adjacent
States. In Maine it is s4a per capita
and in New Hampshire $50. This is
about the average in the older States,
where the farmers are well supplied
with all the requirements of modern
cultivation. In some of the States it is
less, being s26 il Alabama and S23 in
Tennessee. In some ef the States the
per centage of mortgage Of farms IS
very small. In Wisconsin, forinstance,
more than half of the farms of the State
are owned, without mortgage, by those
who cultivate them.
Taking the whole country through,
the aggregate mortgage debt On all
farms is not much more than 10 per
cent. of their total value, and in some
States it is much less than this. The
rate of interest varies from 5! to per
cent. The average is about 7 per ceot.
The rate is highest in those States in
which the legal rate ofinterest is greater
than in Eastern communities. The
legal rate of interest is 6 or 7 per cent.
in most of the States, but in Idaho,
Montana, and Wyoming it is 20 per
cent or more. The more the question
Of farm mortgages is studied the more
clearly it appears that a large number
of the claims Of Populist orators are
unsubstantial and unsubstantiated.
The income from land in every part of
the United States is materially greater
than the mortgage interest, and while
this continues to be so mortgages will
be popular, aud nowhere more so than
IN the city Of New York.