The star. (Reynoldsville, Pa.) 1892-1946, 1907-07-10
What Must Be
Done For Farmers
BY PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT.


We hear a great deal of the need
OF protecting our workmen from COM
petition with pauper labor. have
very little fear of the competition
of pauper labor. The nations with
pauper labor are not the formidable
INDUSTRIAL competitors of this coun-
try. What the American workman
has to fear is the competition of the
highly skilled workman of the coun-
tries of greatest industrial efficiency.
The people of our farming regions
must be able to combine among
themselves, as the most efficient
means of protecting their industry
from the highly organized interests
which now surround them on every
side. A vast field is open for work
by cooperative societies of farmers
In dealing with the relation of the
farm to transportation and to distri-
button and manufacture of raw ma
terials. 1t is only through such COM
bination that American farmers can
develop to sthe full their economic
and social power. Combination of
this kind has, in Denmark, for in
stance, resulted in bringing the peo-
pie back to the land, and has enabled
the Danish peasant to compete in ex-
traordinary fashion, not only at home
but in foreign countries with all RI
walls.
1t is true that agriculture In the
United States has reached a very
high level of prosperity, but we can
not afford to disregard the signs
which teach us that there are influ-
ences operating against the establish.
ment or retention of our country life
upon a really sound basis. The over
expensive and wasteful cultivation of
pioneer days must stop and give place
to a more economical system. Not
only the physical but the ethical
needs of the people of the country
districts must be considered In our
country life there must be social and
intellectual advantages as well as a
fair standard of physical comfort.
There must be in the country, as in
the town, multiplication of move
ments for intellectual advancement
and social betterment.
Ambitious, native-born young men
and women who now tend away from
the farm must be brought back to- it,
and therefore we must have social as
well as economic conditions-libra-
ries, assembly halls, social organiza-
tions of all kinds.
All over the country there is a con-
slant complaint of paucity of farm
labor Without attempting to go into
all the features of this question |
would like to point out that you can
never get the right kind, the best
kind of labor If you offer employment
only for a few months, for no man
worth anything will permanently ac-
cept system which leaves him in
idleness for half the year.
There is plenty that is hard and
rough and disagreeable in the neces-
sary work of actual life; and under
the best circumstances, and no matter
how tender and considerate the hus.
band, the wife will have at least her
full share of work and worry and
anxiety; but IL the man is worth his
salt he will try to take as much as
possible of the burden off the shoul-
ders of his helpmate.
Do not misunderstood me. l have
not the slightest sympathy with those
hysterical and foolish creatures who
wish women to attain to easy lives by
shirking their duties. have as hear
ty contempt for the woman who
shirks her duty of bearing and rear
ing the children, of doing her full
housewives work, as have for the
man who is an idler, who shirks his
duty of earning living for himself
and for his household, or who is sell
fish or brutal toward his wife and
children.
The best crop is the crop of chill
dren; the best products of the farm
are the men and women raised there
on.