The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1916-02-19
LABOR AND FARMERS
SEEjOKER IN. BILL
Fake Rural Credits Measure May
Pass the House of Repre-
sentatives.
TENANT FARMER HAS
NO CHANCE TO BORROW
Will Be Denied Relief for Another
Generation Unless Bill Is
Amended.

WASHINGTON. Feb. ia fake
rural credits bill, known as the Moss
Rural Credits Bill, will be put through
the House of Representatives Of Con-
gress very soon-perhaps this week
unless the farmers and trades union
members and other working people
protest to their representatives
against It.
1t is time to wake up to this dan
ger.
Real rural credits legislation is a
vital need of this period. Land mo-
nopoly is developing beyond all
bounds. There are hundreds of thou
sands of tenant farmers and farmers
who are mortgaged to death or can
not get credit.
Neither Land Nor Credit
There ere great numbers Of people
of the cities who need to have access
to the land. But they cannot get land
and they cannot get credit.
The private banking monopoly
stands between these Industrious
workers and their chance to make a
living II, the production of the food
that is necessary to US all.
The Moss Bill for so-ca1led Rural
Credits is a bankers bill. It is to
benefit investors. like insurance. trust
ment to guarantee their investments
and exempt them from taxation. as
this proposed fake bill does.
Wall Street Backs 1t.
The National City Bank of New
York, the immense Rockefeller finan-
cia1 institution, indorses this bill and
urges its passage. In it's February
bulletin the National City Bank de-
fends The private bankers control of
all loans and credits. But it is candid
enough to let the cat out of the bag
in the closing paragraphs of its re-
view of the bill. It says:
: The plan is, for the most part, an
ingenious adaptation of the Federal
Reserve System. . Probably
the. most frequent comment made
upon it will be that a man who is
able to own a farm subject to no
greater encumbrance than this plan
allows will be able to get along with
out the system. Certainly this is true
in many parts Of the country. but
there IS testimony that in many other
localities it will reduce rates. Ger
tainly, this general plan will facilitate
the movement of capital into and out
of mortgage investments.
Tenant Farmer Out of 1t.
LAS 20 the tenant farmer, now fl
nanced by the landlord and local mer-
chant, whose needs have been the text
for most of the appeals for system
of rural credits, he is outside the pro-
visions Of this measure
This is conservative enough ad-
mission Of the .deformities of the bill
But it let's the cat out of the bag just
the same.
The very prosperous farmer who
owns a productive farm with very
little Or no mortgage against it may
get a somewhat smaller rate of inter-
est by tine terms of this BILL Land
may go up in value through a land
monopoly that the bankers monopoly
is trying to increase by this Joker
legislation, thus making it all the
more difficult for the poor man to
make a living from the land.
Denied Real Rural Credits.
But the average farmer who needs
a chattel loan, who wants loans on his
crops, etc., the tenant farmer and city
worker, who wants chance to put
unproductive and unused land into
production and use, these tillers and
toilers will get no benefit whatever
from this law If it becomes law. On
the contrary, they will be denied for
9nOthAr Qonorafin tho ro1jof fho1, oro
entitled to. They will be denied real
rural credits legislation which would
give them real borrowers right and
set their industry and enterprise free.
This Moss bill, prepared by a Sen
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