The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1896-10-15
The FARMERS STATUS
In Reality Cities Have Prospered
in a Lesser Degree Than
the Country.
A LESSON FROM MINNESOTA.
Large Relative Increase in the Bank
Deposits in Agricultural
Districts.

We have shown elsewhere the utter
falsity of the prctense which forms Oh"
of the stock arguments OF the popuEst
leaders Of this state, that the farmers
of Minnesota have been growing poorer
and that their debts have been growing
heavier year by year for the last ten or
fifteen years. 1t requires considerable
audacity for these fellows to keep on
repeating these statements i'll face OF
the flood of light thrown upon this qucs-
ton by the intelligent researches of La
Dor Commissioner POwers-sOme of the
results of which we have again present
ed. Instead of growing poorer and get
ting more deeply into debt. the statistics
Of the census Office and of his own hu-
reau, as digcsted by him. show that the
farmers of Minnesota owed far less
relatively in 1890 or 1893 than they did
in 1880, Will" they had made immense
gains in wealth and resources. Refer
ring to the editorial article in which we
have presented these facts, it will not
be inOpDOrtune to repeat in connection
with them the facts we stated the other
day showing the large relative increase
in the bank deposits in the agricultural
districts of the state in the last ten years
as compared with the cities These sta
tistics of the deposits i'll the national and
state banks were compiled by Public
Examiner Kenyon and for convenience
they were grouped by congressional dis
tricts. They showed that in st. Paul
and Minneapolis the deposits had in
creased from 1856 to 1896 only about 81
per cent, including with st. Paul. Still
water and all the four counties in its
district, while there was a distinct fall
ing off in these deposits since 1890. The
only other district having considerable
city is the Sixth. in which Duluth is sit
uated, but which embraces twenty coun-
ties, mostly agricultural, and may there
fore be numbered as an agricultural dis
trict. In the districts which embrace
st. Paul and Minneapolis the bank de-
poslts for the years mentioned were as
follows:
1856. 1890. 1896.
St. Paul. etc. .16, 1ss,o27 2o,972 Ala 2o,355, 1913
Minneapolis 1890, 500 q, os2. 4S1 IS. 40. 1923
Now turn to the other districts mostly
First ~ ITO SOS 4o ii 5 5:3-S Sa7
Second ......, 2922o6I$ 244GSil 41l2$ 81
Third .....l SOB 942 2Sa43dt 466 6. 81,
| Seventh 5000. .1.159, 100 1,S53.605 3,O04.079
The First district shows an increase
! in bank deposits of 100 per cent. i'll ten
years: the Second an increase of more
than 400 per cent; the Third, $50 per
cent; the Sixth, 22O per cent, although
| a part of this increase is due to the great
|
cent In all of these districts there
has been a large increase of deposits
during the hard times of the last five
years; in the First district, 30 per cent;
in the Second. 90 per cent; in the Third,
80 per cent: in the Sixth. 33 per cent,
and in the Seventh, 66 per cent. while
during the same period of depression the
deposits fell off about 9 per cent. in Min
neapolis and per cent. i'll st. Paul. in
Guiding the four counties embraced i'll
| the district.
Coupled with the proofs elsewhere Civ
| en- of decreased mortgage Indebtedness
on the farms of this state and of the
increased wealth of the farmers, this
rapid growth of bank deposits in the ag-
| ricultural districts of the state show at
least a very fair degree of prosperity
and that in both respects the farmers Of
the state, as whole, are immensely
better off than the city people, as a
whole.-St. Paul Pioneer Press.