The Washington herald., 1911-12-17
THE BEET SUGAR INDUSTRY
VITAL, DECLARE PRODUCERS
On Commercial Success of New Projects
Depends Future Prosperity of Many
States, and Developments Is Rapid

the arts Of their trade, get employment
With our large railways and our import
ant corporations and then write out all
they can learn for the use of the author
tiles in Washington. We are afraid to
hire man unless We know all about
him.
THE directors of a railroad are sup
posed to have, or should have, the priv
ileges accorded TO the employees of the
company Were a New York Central or
Pennsylvania director to go aboard a
train, however, accompanied by his wife,
and were the conductor to permit the
wife to ride free, a government spy would
report the matter to the Interstate Com
merce Commission, and Mr.. Brown, or
Mr.. McCrea, president of the road. would
be required to explain the matter. The
government sends for books and papers
of business concerns and then hunts for
evidence that the companies may be
harshly fined or the managers threatened
with terms in Jail. Nowhere else on
earth are business men badgered and bull
lied by politicians and officeholders.
The conduct of Mr.. Wickersham the
Attorney General, is something of a puz-
Zle to me at times He comprehends
business conditions. having been a law
Yer for important interests before going
into Mr.. Taft's Cabinet Now, however.
ne is fighting business harder than any
one else. Gen. Grant said that the way
to get rid of an unpopular law is to en-
force it. Perhaps Mr.. Wickersham is
trying to make the Sherman antitrust
act so obnoxious and so destructive that
Congress will change il or strike it alto
gether from the statute book
The sugar beet has its prophets and it's
advocates Mr.. Duval is one Of them
why pay foreign countries and our
island possessions more than $3.50 O0O, COO
annually for an article of food that can
he produced at home?' he asks. Thus he
and others measure in money the direct
benefits Of beet culture. The indirect
benefits, worked out by mathematics. are
simply astonishing. The claim is made
and it is supported by witnesses here and
abroad, that ground in which beets have
grown will produce more wheat, oats
rye, barley, and potatoes than II would
produce were beetS not planted. The in
crease Is said to range between % and 50
per cent. And it is needed in the United
States, where farming is clumsy, waste
full and unintelligent, and where the cost
of living is causing complaint.
PIow Deeply, Said Cato, the Censor.
Scientific agriculture is not an Ameri-
can invention, although it is thought to
be. To the contrary. agriculture in this
country has always been ignorantIy and
eXtravagantly conducted, and is yet. 1t
has taken years and the Ceaseless work
Of persistent men to show some Of the
farmers of the South that shallow plow-
ing is not profitable in cotton raising
Cato, the Censor, born in Italy 234 years
before the coming of Christ a great
statesman soldier. and writer, asked:
What is the first principle Of good ag-
riculture?" Answering his own question
h. --,iI To r1a ,r-a1I A.
the second prinCipIe?' ITO pIow again."
he replied. The free use OF fertilizer, he
declared, was the third principle.
For centuries after Cato the principal
business of the world was to fight, the
best men-the strongest and the most en-