The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1913-04-26
Will Be Made BY American
Commission on Agricul-
tural Cooperation.
SAILED FOR EUROPE
Dinner Given Last Evening
AT Which Many Prominent
Men Were Present.
tNational News Association,


NEW YORK, April 26.-The men,
bers of the American Commission
on Agricultural Cooperation, who
sailed for Europe today on the Sax
onia, to make an exhaustive study OF
European rural credits were given
dinner at the Hotel McAlpin last night,
by e. N. Bretung. Thursday President
Wilson bid the members bon voyage
at the White House and the Secretary
of Agriculture accompanied the party
to New York for the dinner. Walter
H. Page, the appointee to the post
of Ambassador of the Court of st.
James and his son Frank Page, who
will accompany the commission on it's
tour were also present at the dinner
Among the speakers at the banquet
were Secretary of Agriculture Hous-
ton, Senator Fletcher. of Florida; SEN
ator Thomas p. Gore, of Oklahoma;
Ambassador Page. John Barrett, Di-
rector General of the Pan-American
Union and the Hon. Walter Scott,
Premier of Saskatchewan, Canada.
Senator Fletcher in his speech said
in part:
1.-THE thought uppermost in mind on
this, the evening before our departure,
is that the task before the American
Commission on Agricultural Co-opera-
ton is more than the short three
months work that lies before us in
Europe. Let us remember that this
undertaking in which we are engaged
is even unknown in principle, in this
country, and that it's lessons must be
spread among twelve million farmers
distributed over the three million
square miles of this union.
Farmers Need Capital.
"But surely the results promised
make even such task seem slight.
If every farmer in the United States
could secure adequate capital to make
his farm the most profitable and most
productive enterprise that II possibly
could be made, the consumers of this
country would receive an added store
of wealth far greater, far more lasting.
than has ever been given to the ma
ton by it's mines of gold.
"For this republic the present is an
era of economic changes. Our farm
ers must adopt new methods to meet
the changed conditions. They can no
longer afford to allow their lands to
lose their fertility, and then to aban-
don them. There are now practically
no new farm lands for them to move
to. But this change in conditions need
not and should not check the progress
of American agriculture. In fact, ii
should mark the commencement of a
more permanent progress along other
lines.
"The very disappearance of free
farms and cheap farms from this
country must necessarily strengthen
and steady farm values This means
that American farmers will have Sc
curity acceptable in the business world
to offer when they need money, and
with such improved security they car
obtain for themselves the money
necessary to the full development OF
their land and on terms far more ad
vantageous than now prevail.
s'This has been accomplished in
Europe. We are about to see in
stances of intensive cultivation which
/ fear may bring the whole idea OF
intensive cultivation into disrepute in
your minds We will see women and
even children at work in the fields
and we will see whole families. with q