The San Francisco call., 1895-10-18
M0RTGAGED FARMERS.

There is class of calamity howlers in
this and other countries who believe that
the world is going TO the dogs, because in
all new countries large number, probably
majority, of the farms are mortgaged.
These people forget that the mortgage has
been used since the dawn of civilization,
and the world has never gone to the dogs
yet. And it is not going there now. There
is no other possible way under our present
civilization whereby young and energetic
men OF small means can get the oppor-
tunity to build themselves up by applying
capital to land, except the security of the
mortgage.
At the same time it is ooubtle ess essen
tial that the amount, the interest rate and
the application Of the money be such as to
promise a. profit on the investment and to
pay off the debt, and it is also unquestIon-
ably true that wild and wholly foolish
estimates of the income-producing power
OF land have induced many mortgage
loans in this and other countries which
bankers ought not to have made and
farmers ought not to have accepted. Es-
pecially is it true that in countries which,
like some portions of California, have
methods money has been invested and
lost, and years of labor spent and also lost
This cannot now be helped. Nature is
an inexorable punisher of error, and the
penalty must be paid.
Some farmers will lose their homes
some bankers will lose their loans; some
tradesmen will fail from inability to col
lect. But the world will not go to the
dogs, and twenty years from now these
troubles will seem only like the remem-
brance of bad dream.
We take the financial situation to be
simply this: Modern science has SO in
creased the capacity to produce all commod-
ltles that the channels of exchange are
choked. There is a surplus of all things
This is not poverty but wealth, and out of
this must necessarily come in due time
great prosperity and higher plane of civil
ization. In the meantime there is the great
distress inevitably accompanying rapid in
dustrlal changes. Those workers who
have been displaced by machinery and it's
results have now no way except by lndul-
gence whereby they can get any share of
the worlds surplus.
These conditions can change only as the
impetus of this era of industrial invention
exhausts itself. Industrial conditions take
on some appearance of permaDence, man.
kind adjusts itself TO the situation and
population begins to press harder upon the
means of subsistence. This will be a slow
but absolutely sure process. Those whom
changed co nditions have thrown out Of
employment will in the end find work
in new enterprises. Farmers whose prod
ucts are no longer remunerative will find
other products which do pay. The true
income value of land will be understood,
and farm mortgages will again be regarded
and used as aids, not to speculation, but to
enterprise.
1t is the interest as well as the duty OF
society to make this inevitable read Just
ment as painless as possible. 1t seems
that this effort is being made on the whole
with good results.
The conservative investors who kept their
heads during the boom report interest col
lectlons as far better this year than last.
Those who were less careful in loaning are
recognizing the situation, meeting their
mortgagors more than half way and dis
turDlng no one who is making an effort for
himself. In many cases they are giving the
AID OF their financial experience to the bet
ter handling of the property with most
excellent results. The more of this sort