The Kennewick courier-reporter. [volume] (Kennewick, Wash.) 1914-1938, 1916-08-17
Letters From the People

I'LL Letters From the PeOple mn
y.
To the Editor ea 81. .~'a
Brother Lynch is trying to bring
prosperity back to Kennewick again.
It seems anyone should like the cour-
age he has displayed in his article.
He says his article is not plea for
the farmer to trade with his home
merchant. How on earth can they
live if the laborer at the source OF
production don't let them have hand
in the distribution. Now, / care not to
uphold the mailorder business until 1t
becomes an economic necessity with
the producer or buyer.
But they tell us that in business
time is money. Now let us go back in
history and think of our past. In our
forward progress new methods save
us time and labor. So the telephone
came into use much quicker than mail
service. Yes, and we still have them
and who now wants to do without
them? And to think that the lazy
housewife can sit in her easy chair
and write up an order for goods that
is Just as apt to contain just as much
wool as is promised in the catalogue.
The chemical test is the only sure way
to tell whether a garment is all wool
or part wool. So the mail order buyer
considers that he is taking even
chances. But why not have just one
mail order house in Kennewick or a
catalogue house? Then by adding
TRANSFORMATION charges we should be
able to trade as cheap as anywhere,
for the mailorder house, like the tele-
phone, has come to stay. Two stores
of the same kind in town are just cut
ting each others Threats to see which
one can get the most of the farmers
thirty-cent dollar. But the old false
hood chat competition is necessary"
at the present day is the thing that is
playing havoc with both farmer and
!. merchant.
In the same article values are all
crumbled to pieces. To go back to
our economics we find that values are
made by necessity or demand for an
article. Then in land we find that
value is made or increased in two ways
/. the first is productive value; the
second social value. Now, dear read
er, which is the most important or
necessary? We work the farms and
need the farm to produce food, shelter
. and clothing - the most important
things to us in all this world, and there
is where we get our productive value
Social value, then, can only come when
! two or more of us want the same thing
or piece of land. And the increased
|. price over the productive value would
!. be the social value. Now, show me
!. where fourteen stores in Kennewicl
! represents any more value than one
large store.
Another thing in the line of infor
!: nation. Today, as never before, WI
) hear so much about good man or
good citizen or good former for OF
fee or for honoring some one that ha
gone. What is the standard by which
|: we can select the good man?
i Again, if $200,0O0 of catalog price
/ were kept here, what percentage o
: it would the merchants of Kennewic
+ retain for their part. And if Their
: are 500 ranchers adjacent to Kenne
= wick, that would mean just $4OO t
e each rancher. Mr.. Rancher OF tn
r Kennewick Valley, how many OF yo
+ have a s400 income? Every farme
in the valley that has found a piece
land that was fertile before it wa
e. seeded to some legume to enrich i
l. please hold up your hand. River
washed sand may be rich, but it woul
have to be rich in minerals. The REF
l. trouble with the rancher is this: a
il the top left-hand corner OF the sam
a, page that Mr.. Lynch's article is Of
are two advertisements. The top or
concerns tobacco, and few otht
e. things such as intoxicating liquor ar
q, superstition has stifed too man
n brains and so they easily gulp dow
IS, such ads as the second one. Also Il
r. ones by the railroad owners and Il
I'd steel trust. So it leaves our commul
ity in poverty-stricken conditit
while the big monopolies skin US
re- to a fair. And we only fool no o.
re- but ourselves.
10 Mr.. Farmer, and even the mercnai