The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-04-07
ROOSEVELT SPOKE
OF LABORING MEN
Wage Workers and TiIlers Of the Soil'' Was the
Subject of His Speech at Sioux Falls

Sioux Falls, S. D., April 6.-President
roosevelt began the second week of his
.orr feeling much refreshed from yes
+ardav's rest, and at 1850 o'clock start
al IN a drive over the city with Sec
retarv Loeb, Senator Kittridge and
,favor Burnside. Despite the early
hour and dreary weather, the streets
we're lined with people, who greeted
the President with cheers and waving
of flags, and at 500 o'clock the Presi-
dent arrived at the big auditorium,
where he addressed 1000 children.
AS the President left the auditorium,
he was greeted with tremendous ap-
nlause. He was driven rapidly to the
stand, which had been erected at the
corner of Ninth street and Phillips
avenue, where a crowd of 5000 people
had assembled. The President was in
troduced by Senator Kittridge and
smoke on the Wage Worker and the
Tiller of the SOIL" During his speech
snow began to fall, but the President
was clad in a heavy overcoat and was
well protected. He said he was glad
10 be again in the banana belt"
which remark created laughter.
He spoke, in part, as follows:
There are many, many lesser prob
lens which go to make up in their en-
tirety the huge and complex problems
of our modern industrial life. Each
of these problems is, moreover, con-
nected with many of the others. Few
indeed are simple or stand only by
themselves. The most important are
those connected with the relation of
the farmers, the stock growers and
soil tiIlers, to the community at
large, and those affecting the relations
between employer and employed. In
a country like ours it is fundamentally
true that the well-being of the tiller
of the soil and the wageworker is the
well-being of the state. If they are
well off then we need concern our
selves but little as to how other
classes stand, for they will inevitably
be well off too; and, on the other
hand there can be no real general
prosperity unless based on the foun-
datIon of the prosperity of the wage
worker and the tiller of the soil.
But the needs of these two classes
are often not the same. The tiller of
the soil has been of all our citizens
llt OIt Oll4 TIE WuOl6 Tie lGdSl dlLGCl-
ed in his ways of life and methods of
industry by the giant Industrial
changes of the last half century.
There has been change with him, too,
of course. He also can work to best
advantage if he keeps in close touch
with his fellows; and the success of
the National Department of Agricul-
ture has shown how much can be done
for hip by rational action of the gov
eminent. Nor is it only through the
department that the government can
act One of the greatest and most
benetcent measures passed by the last
Congress, or indeed by any Congress
in recent years, is the irrigation act,
which will do for the states of the
great plains and the Rocky Mountain
Region at least as much as ever has
been done for the states of the humid
region by river and harbor improve
ments Few measures that have been
put upon the statute books of the
nation have done more for the people
than this law will l firmly believe,
directly and indirectly accomplish for
the states in question.
The Department of Agriculture has
been helping our fruit men to estab-
lish markets abroad by studying meth
DDS OF fruit preservation through re-
frigeration and through methods of
handling and packing. On the Gulf
coasts of Louisiana and Texas, thanks
to the Department of Agriculture, a
rice suitable to the region was import
ed from the Orient and the rice crop is
now practically equal to our needs in
this country whereas a few years can
it supplied but one-fourth of them.
The most important of our farm pro-
ducts is the grass crop, and to show
what has been done with grasses, l
need only to allude to the striking