The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1910-09-20
SAYS TRUSTS ARE
CHEATING FARMERS.
THE HEAD OF PENNSYLVANIA
GRANGE DECLARES THEY
PREVENT MANuFAC-
TURE OF ALCOHOL.

Philadelphia, Sept. 20.-'F'armer"
William It. Greasy OF Catawissa, mas
ter of the Pennsylvania state grange
has given his fellow farmers something
new to think about regarding the DOM
ination Of legislation by big business
interests.
In a speech at White City park,
Chestnut hill he charged that the
Standard Oil and whisky trusts have
joined hands to throttle federal meas
ures, intended to foster the manufac-
ture of denatured alcohol in this coun-
try. This double-barreed scheme,
Greasy said, is robbing the states
rural population of cheap fuel, Is pre-
venting the denatured alcohol industry
from growing and incidentally is MAX
ing fodder for the intrests.
1T is now nearly four years" said
Farmer Greasy, since the denatured
alcohol laws were enacted, and we are
APPARENTLY no nearer the establishment
of agricultural distiileries than when
the laws first went into effect. Is 1t
true the farmers were given gold
brick in this legislation, or is the situ-
alton one in which there is more work
for the farmer to do?"
Concluding that it will take sledge-
hammer methods to force favorable
legislation tending toward the estab-
lishment of such distilleries, Greasy
urged that the Pennsylvania state
grange line up with the other states
that are working for the passage Of
necessary federal measures.
Use of denatured alcohol on the
farm, he pointed out, is increasing
rapidly in spite of the relative cheap
ness Of petroleum products, and the
merits of alcohol as source of energy
have attracted wide attention. The
greatest advantages to be reaped from
a denatured alcohol law are its bene-
fits to agriculture in the shape of d.
versifcation of crops, enhanced pro-.
ductiveness of unfertile soil, and uti1i-
cation Of what otherwise would be
waste crops. Withal, Greasy declared
nothing has been done to enable far
mers to make their own alcohol And
this is where the twin trusts have got
in their work, he said
There is every indication that the
activities that seemed so full of prom
Use at the beginning of 1908 have prac-
tically ceased, and we constantly find
statements in the papers that the law
has been a failure and that the farmer
has been humbugged.
$50 prevalent are these statements
that / am constrained to believe a sys-
temattc effort Is being made to dis
courage development and prevent
practical progress. That this may be
more than an inference may be as
sumed from the fact that a standpat
congress refused to make any further
appropriations, and thus tied the
hands of the agricultural department.
and that monopoly in denatured al
cohol is we'll under way. Isl
THE industrial group composing
this monopoly is, on the surface, com
prised of the United States Industrial
Alcohol Co., an $4,000, 900 corporation,
and number of subsidiary companies
which it absolutely controls.
Principal among these are the
Wood Products Co, or wood alcohol
trust and the Alcohol Utilities Co AS
understand it, back of the United
States Industrial Alcohol co. and alb
solutely controlling it is the Distill-
ers' Securities Co., or the whisky trust,
as it is commonly called, and back Of
this Is believed to be the Standard Oil
CO."
Industry Developed In Germany.
Then Farmer Greasy showed thar
in Germany 1887 agricultural dis
tilleries produced S6,0OO,O0O gallons Of
alcohol annually. Considering the size
of this country, he added, it would re-
quire 100000 distilleries to place the
development of the industry on a par
with that of Germany. Such a group
of distilleries could produce denatured
alcohol equal to one-half of the total
Standard Oil output.
IN the opinion of the master of the
state grange of Washington, denatured
alcohol at 80 cents a gallon would drive
kerosene oil off the farm.
1T is plain" continued Greasy,
"that should alcohol distilleries de-
velop in this country, they would cut
big hole in Standard Oil business,
and at least force a big reduction in
kerosene and gasoline prices"
We have attacked the problem of es-
tablishing distilleries in this country,
the speakers said, as pioneers instead
of going to Germany to get the benefit
of their twenty years experience in the
business.