East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current, 1908-08-15
ROOSEVELT WOULD MAKE PLANS
FOR BETTER FARM CONDITIONS

With a view to bringing about bet
ter social, sanitary and economic con-
diuons on American farms, President
Roosevelt has requested four experts
on country life to make an investiga-
tion into the whole matter and to re-
port TO him with recommendations for
improvements The report and rec
ommendation with any additional rea-
sons which the president himself may
desire to make will be incorporated
in message which the president will
send to congress probably next year.
The men President Roosevelt has
asked to act as an investigating COM
mittee are: Professor A. L. Bailey OF
the New York College of Agriculture;
Henry Wallace of Wallace's Farmer,
Des Moines, Iowa; President Kenyon
L. Butterfield, Massachusetts, Agricul-
tural college; Clifford Pinchot Of the
United States forestry service, and
Walter H. Page, editor of the Worlds
Work, New York.
In letter TO Professor Bailey ask
Ing him TO accept the craftsmanship
OF the committee the president out
lines his desires in the direction of
improvement on the farm. The let
ter follows:
my Dear Professor Bailey:-No
nation has ever achieved permanent
greatness unless this greatness was
based on the we'll being OF the great
farmer class-the men who live on
the soil, for it is upon their welfare,
material and moral, that the welfare
OF the rest of the nation ultimately de-
pends.
I'm the United States, disregarding
certain sections and taking the nation
as a whole, believe it to be true that
the farmers are better off today than
they ever were before We Ameri-
cans are making progress in the de-
velopment of agricultural resources,
but it is equally true tnat the social
and economic institutions of the open
country are not keeping pace with the
development OF the nation as a whole.
The farmer as a rule is better off
than his forbears, but his increase in
well being has not kept pace with
that Of the country as a whole.
While the condition Of the farm
ers in some of our best farming re-
gions leaves little to be desired, we
are far from having reached SO high
a level in all parts of the country.
In portions Of the south, for example,
where the department of agriculture
through the farmers cooperative
demonstration work Of DR.. Knapp, is
directly insructing more than 30,-
900 farmers in better methods of
farming, there is nevertheless much
unnecessary suffering and needless
loss of efficiency on the farm. A
physician who is also a careful stu
dent Of farm life in the south, writing
to me recently about the enormous
percentage of preventable deaths of
children due to the unsanitary condi-
tions on southern farms, said
Personally, from the health point
Of view, I would rather see my own
daughter, years old, at work in a
cotton mill than have her live as
tenant on the average southern farm.
This apparently extreme statement is
based upon actual life among both
classes Of people
Il doubt if any other nation can
bear comparison with our own in the
amount Of attention given by the gov
eminent both federal and state. to
agricultural matters No little part
Of the effort has hitherto been direct
ed TO the increasing Of the production
Of crops. Our attention. has been con-
centrated almost exclusively on get
ting better farming. In the beginning
this was unquestionably the right
thing TO do The farmer must first
of all grow good crops in order to sup
port himself and family, but when
this has been secured the effort for
better farming should cease to stand
alone and should be accompanied by
the effort for better business and bet