The Lakeland evening telegram. (Lakeland, Fla.) 1911-1922, 1916-07-27
Farmers
Indebted
To Fletcher

When President Wilson signed
the rural credits bill, on July II,
and it became law, the end came
of one of the long and hard strug-
giles of the Sixty-fourth Congress.
This act is regarded as a triumph of
fairness and justice. To Senator
Duncan U. Fletcher of Florida, more
than to any other one man, the
farmers Of the country are indebted
for this law.
Altogether there have been 118
rural credits bills introduced in Con-
gress. These have included every
shade of opinion, from that which
favored government supervision Of
a farm mortgage system, to that of
making loans by the government to
farmers.
The bill. as passed and signed
a concise abstract of which appeared
on the first page of Friday morn
ing's Patriot-and as described by
President Wilson, puts the farmers
upon an equality with all others
who have genuine assets, and makes
the great credit OF the country avail
able to them"
Successful farming is strictly a de-
velopment proposition, so far as time
lis concerned. It is a matter of
years.
Because the farmers have had no
way to get money at fair rate on
long time, the evils of the landlord
system, one of which is the high cost
of food, have increased by leaps and
bounds in the last quarter of CEN
fury, and rent-paying tenantry was
becoming as common in this country
as in Europe.
The farmers have never had bor-
rowing privileges without which the
manufacturing and commercial in
terests of the country would perish.
National banks were prohibited from
foaninS any part of their capital on
real estate mortgages.
One reason for this was that the
banking business, organized for COM
mercial purposes, could be made sue
cessful only by dealing in short time
paper-turning loans over rapidly
and many times. Short-time paper
could not answer the needs of farm
ers, especially those who wanted to
buy farms of their own Hence farm
ers have been largely shut out of the
borrowing privilege on the best
terms.
Recently, as farming methods have
become more scientific, the farmers
condition has become worse. Within
a few years agricultural processes
have been revolutionized. This comes
to every country with the exhaustion
of the original fertility of the soil.
New methods are REQUIRED in every
branch of production. Capital is Of
ten needed. A low rate OF interest
must be had. Hence such relief as is
proposed in the new rural credits
law.
The fact is apparent that the best
farmers are now trained in agricul-
tural colleges. Farming is a science.
Even the small farmer must practice
intensive scientific methods. Among
other things he is learning that
there is no such thing as permanent
ly profitable farming without live
stock--cows. sheep, swine, poultry,
etc.
And it takes at least FIVE years
to get a farm started along right
lines, or to change from exclusive
grain production as a cash crop, to
stock and grain farming; another
five to get it in fair productive con-
dition; and another five to perfect
it.
The farmer needs money to make
the change; he needs money If he
buys land partly on credit; and he
needs 1t at low rate of interest and
ON long time. This is exactly what
the new rural credits bill is intended
to do for him.
1t will enable the small farmer,
err. supplemented by his own intelli-
gent effort, to prosper. 1t will en-
courage the back-to-the land move
ment 1t is step in doing away with
the growth of nonresident landlord
ism in the United States. 1t certain
ly will help the so per cent of the
nations agriculturists, who are now
tenant farmers, to become land and
home owners.
All that is now needed is that the
rural credits law shall be faithfully
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