Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1897-10-27
0old-Bugism A Barrier.


The good fortune that one dollar
wheat brings to the farmers of the
United States is to that class of our
citizenship where broad-minded and
statesmanlike view is taken of public
questions. Which view is no doubt in
duced, and is directly traceable, to the
past few years of universal study of
economic questions. The farmer of
to-day knows why he gets dollar for
wheat, and he is not going to felicitate
himself on the misery of others, with
out deep concern regarding the fu-
ture.
Those who understand the causes of
the low prices of property know what
the fate of the American farmer must
be when the distressing cause is re-
moved that has temporarily benefited
him by giving him a price for his
wheat that has never before in our
history been regarded as anything but
low and usual, but which we are now
expected to believe is exceedingly
high.
There never has been, aud is not
now, any reason offered why, when
all circumstances and conditions are
carefully considered, wheat should
not be at least $3.50 a bushel on the
farms of Kansas, and were it possible
to bring any agricultural commodity
in actual control of the law of supply
and demand, regardless of the bicker-
ings and chickering's of Liverpool and
Wall Street gamblers and speculators,
it would have been sometime ago.
Many farmers have, almost within the
recollection of the average school boy,
received on the farm 81. so bushe1 for
his wheat under far less favorable con-
ditions than the present. We believe
it is not controverted proposition
that the demand for wheat is the most
phenominal recorded in years.
The European deficit is 3S4 ZOO, 900
bushels; the worlds supply is about
zoe, 900 900 bushels less than its nec-
essary consumption, and, to supple
ment this fact comes information from
the great North West that Mime
sota's yield is 20 per cent less than
last year; North Dakota 80 per cent
less, and South Dakota so per cent
less, and it has taken all this, with the
combined strength of all other possi-
BILE force, to bring wheat to the dollar
mark-in. New York. Why not on the
farms of Kansas? Certainly the con-
ditions could not be more propitious
than at present.
But, accepting present conditions,
the farmer, looking at the price of
wheat, can smile to know that thereby
a means has been placed in the hands
of the yeomanry of the United States
which may enable them to stave off
the wolf from their doors, while they
are preparing to lead a host of Free
men against the despotism that seeks
their enslavement and the ultimate
overthrow of the Republic.
And, it is to us more a cause of
providential gratitude that so, ,OOO, 900
bushels, or about one-tenth of the entire
wheat product of the United States,
has been produced where, for this pur-
pose, it will do the most good, in Kan
sas, John uBrowu-Kansas; Jim-Lane.
Kansas; bloody-1iberty-loving Kansas,
that leads in the revolution that is now
the serious question of the hour and
must not stop until the things we call
despotism and egotism are ana1yzed,
and their maternal cause is banished
forever from our shores.
Neither can the plutocratic press
blind the eyes of the thinking citizen
to the fact that the average range
price of silver and the average range
price of wheat will keep pace. 1t will
be remembered that the demand for
wheat, for well known reasons, is
phenomenal, while the demand for sill
yer is almost exclusively, and has
been for several years, by legislative
enactment, confined to the Arts.
Suppose the leading commercial ma
tions should declare that wheat should
be limited in its uses to the making
of bran. What would be the effect on
the price of wheat? Wouldn't the
phenomenal" demand for wheat dis.
appear?
It is certainly a dishonest and in
sidious argument that waits for the
most favorable spasmodic conditions
under which to draw comparisons lad
mitting conditionaliy that their COM
parsons amount to anything) and we
contend that when the demand for
wheat is phenomenal" and the 1egis-
lation against silver is also sspheuom-
inal" is not the exact moment IN
which to draw an honest inference as
to their party.
The Chicago Bulletin, commenting
on this proposition says: