Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-10-04

time another, have tired to leglSate
their troubles out of existence but the scheme refused
to work. Law making is easy enough but there
too many holes in that SKINNER. Laws there must
be- OF course; but the mere multiplication of statutes
directed to practical end has proved to be of no
account. Almost the only worthy accomplishment
of the farmers in legislation has been the making of
commission which would give that law effect. That
has helped and it promises still greater help
the future: and various State commissions, pat
termed after the national getting good results in
several fields For the most part, however. the
farmers victory has been in the give and take
of actual industrial struggle These folk fighting
by the professional politicians; for experience has
proved that it is safer easier and altogether better
to work out plan of salvation in the sweat of the
brow than to rely upon the hand-me- down methods
of the demagogues. This discovery has been long
step forward.
It is fair to blame the western farmer because
he spent good time finding out these things.
There other way; for this brand new
country barely half century ago, the conditions of
success quite unknown. Toss cat into strange
yard, and it will alght its feet with jaunty
but there seems to be another dispensation in the
affairs of men. The man, plunged headlong into
unknown Wilderness must have time given him
for finding his disturbed center of gravity.
Prairie development did not really begin in earnest
until after the close of the Civil War. Prior to that
time there had been good deal of adventurng
around, inspired by the excitement of frontierng,
Indian fighting, and such; but conquest and sober
balance of affairs delayed. The first railway
west of the Missouri River not laid till about
Distribution of Immigrants
THEN immigration and settlement began with
rush. 1t knew no caution or restraint; its for
ward impulse carried it almost at once to the very
foothills of the Rockies. The ruling motive moth
ing but enthusiasm, and this amounted to very
ecstasy. Land was plentiful everywhere, and could
be had for the taking and in this first happy state the
people easily blinked the great fact that they were
wholly ignorant of the conditions governing crop
growing, and the other fact that the markets for the
products of their first years of labor very re-
mote. 1t easy enough to foresee that here
mighty empire must one day be established; but
the pioneers made the very natural mistake of think
ing that they could reach the goal by single light
footed hop. step and jump. In their exalted state
of mind they would have been utterly downcast by
the prospect of quarter-century of weary Flooding
that must end at last in failure Confidence
ried to excess land values doomed: the set
tiers loaded themselves with debts upon the most
extravagant terms. And then came the sure reac-
ton,-the mockery of abundant yields left to rot
the ground, and then the lean years of crop
failure, when debts falling due and creditors
were pressing After period of tense suspense. the
crash in the panic year of 1893. with the his
toric hot wind horror year later. That was the