The Leavenworth echo. [volume] (Leavenworth, Wash.) 1904-current, 1910-04-01

In other words, the piano had I'M
doubtedly been blown out of the
window.
Now comes the gentleman who says
the plaintiff never owned musical in
strument larger than mouth organ.
His name is w. c. Brown. He is
president OF the New York Central
railroad. In an address before the New
England Railroad club, at Boston, he
gave his testimony. Like President
Taft, he began about the increased
production of gold and ended by blam-
ing the farmer. This is what he said:
Statistics show that the failure to in
crease the product Of our farms in any
thing like the ratio of increase in con-
sumption is exerting more than three
times the effect upon the cost of living
than the increase of gold is having"
This pleasing and remarkable state
ment becomes the more pleasing and
remarkable when the fact is explained
that there are no statistics to show what
effect the increased production of gold
is having upon prices; that nobody
knows exactly to what extent increased
gold has increased prices and that no
one knows to what extent decreased
acreage production has affected prices
or whether it has affected them at all,
coming, as it has, simultaneously with
increased per capita production. Mr..
Brown has therefore performed the re-
markable mathematical feat of determ-
lining that one unknown quantity is
having three times the effect upon
the cost of living" that another I'M
known quantity is having. But read
on:
/ Il doubt if any country in the
world" he said, "excels the United
States in natural fertility of soil; but
with our careless methods of produc-
ton, our farms produce an annual yield
of less than IA bushels of wheat per
acre, as compared with 80 in England,
% in Germany, "a in the Neither
lands, and 20 in France. Germany,
with an arabic area of less than some Of
our states, produces more than seven
times as many bushels of potatoes as
are produced in all of our States"
Now, sit tight for the peroration:
In this grave crisis, which, fully
understood, is as grave as any this
country has ever known, lantern will
again flash its message of warning, and
another Paul Revere will sound the
alarm, once more arousing the farmer
to the danger which impends; and, as
in all the years Of the past the farmer
has responded to the nations need, so
will he now respond again."
If he does it will be a great sight.
A fire alarm from a box factory would
indeed produce but poor spectacle in
an engine house as compared with the
American farmer, bursting out of his
house at midnight, to 60 with MIR.
Brown and save the nation. But never
mind.
The point is that this sort of testi-
mony makes the prisoner at the bar
Mr.. Corporate Greed-feel pretty good.
The accuser-Mr. Public Opinion
sort of looks around to see if he has a
friend in the house. To continue the
court dream, will the readers of this ar
ticle kindly consent to serve as the
jury2 There is another side to this
case. Will you hear it? Please don't
send poor old Mr.. Public Opinion
away to the hulks on the testimony,
even of eminent witnesses, that he
never owned a piano, and, that at any
rate, it was probably blown away
That's enough of the dream. Now
for the facts.
1t is NOT true that the public is
NOT being robbed. 1t is NOT true
that the scarcity Of food products JUS
titles the high prices. 1t IS true that
it is worth while to expose-and to ex-
pose with facts-the fallaciousness of
the argument OF every man who pleads
to the contrary.
Big men are pleading to the con-
trary. The biggest one of the lot is
not William H. Taft, but James j.
Hill. Hill is supplying all the rest of
them with ammunition. Taft is but an