The Ordway new era., 1914-01-02

the temple OF national safety. Their
possession can make even the new
emigrant patriot. Congested cent
ers of homeless, propertyless people
are the menance. No demagogue. no
nihilistic propaganda can sweep a
community of home owners or soil
cultivators from their anchorage of
pariotism; no political convulsion can
shake. our institutions or lead astray
those who own the land they plow
and reap. To discourage large hold
ings of public domain, to encourage
ownership of ten, twenty and forty
acre farms. is becoming an economic
policy of profound wisdom. The ma
ton would be stronger. the average
of the people more prosperous If
there was no farm over loo acres in
extent. Small farms would mean di-
versified crops, intense and cereful
cultivation. 1t would double the pro-
duction upon the same number of
acres. 1t would raise the average
yield Of wheat in the United States
from thirteen to thirty bushels and
other crops in proportion. The rap
id absorption of all desirable land,
the resistless pressure of an increas-
ing population makes this problem
of immediate moment.
The present adjustment of produc-
ton and distribution does not seem
to meet the requirements of free
people. Something is wrong, when in
land of plenty and opportunity
bread lines form and thousands surge
from city to city seeking employ
ment. 1t is not an ideal condition
where honest men seek work in vain !;
not an ideal state where labor and
capital both think it necessary to
keep pickets out; not credit to
democracy when in our cities the
brewery is the advisor and contribu-
tor to both political parties and the
saloon a potent factor in politics.
These with the official CRATER and
corporation briber are the Hun. the
Vandal and the Goth of the republic
and civilization. These evils are city
bred. They can only flourish where
man is homeless and landless. The
man who plows field and plants a
Itree can be trusted. he will defend the
flag and never pollute it. Hay fields
and orchards, pasture and garden
land may not develop millionares, but
they will raise men and diffuse pros
|perity and independence. The prayer
of the patriarch was that he be given
neither poverty or riches. In an ir-
Irrigated region of small farms, this
ideal can be realized. There will be
no rich. no poor; all free, equal and
independent. The test of civiliza-
tion is the average welfare of all. not
the opuIence of few. England loans
fifteen billions of dollars to other
nations, yet has more paupcrs than
the nations that borrow her gold.
Eight thousand people own all her
land and million mendicants walk
her streets and highways. Iowa. Da-
kota, Kansas and other agricultural
states loan no money abroad, but
they have no paupers, no one hungry
no professional servant in all their
millions. Those who raise alfalfa
and apples, who own and work their
limited acres, will not be interested
in the price of private cars but they
, will never know the road that leads
to Insolvency. The bankrupt court
is AN unknown continent to them, but
their days will be filled with health
ful and useful toll and their nights
with untroubled dreams. The tilling
of the soil is the first OF profession,
the king of trades. There is no
danger line in land culture. no ship
wrecks, no collisions or derailments,
no explosions, no risks or hazards to
insure against With industry. COM
mon sense and water, the harvests
sure Now and then gold brick, a
bogus tree man or a bunco machine
or book agent extracts tributes, but
these are minor annoyanccs, but
mosquitoes of life. Altogether it is
not only the oldest but the safest
business. 1t is self reliant pursuit,
Ia respectable vocation. No man
ever attained such eminence in our
country that he WAS not proud to
claim the farm as his origin. Four
teen of our presidents have been
tillers of the soil. More greatness has
come from the cradle of the rural
cottages than from city palaces. 1t
gives to the diligent and sensible a
certain livelihood and independence
and these arc Of more worth than