davidaulloa/AmericanStories huggingface dataset:
The Morgan City daily review. (Morgan City, La.) 1916-1920, 1917-07-12

I'VE are members Of The Moran
City and Berwick Chamber Of Com
merce. Are yeu?)
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
AGRICULTURAL ARMY AWAITED
BY FARMERS Mobiles SLOWLY
Only Through Systematic Efforts Of Highly Organized Bureaus Under the Hec
ton SPECIALISTS Enough Efficient Labor Be Recruited Give the
Nation Assurance Of an Adequate Supply OF rood

ordinate all Of these into one nation
wide system, just as the central
office in Columbus controls the TWEEN
tv-one Offices in Ohio, we should have
an increase in farm workers that
will seem incredible TO those who
are not familiar with the work that
a few Of the states are now doing.
But this means careful planning,
compact organization, centralized re-
sponsibility and employment experts
to attend to numerous matters Of de-
tail as is done in Ohio. It cannot
be accomplished by mere publicity or
by mushroom employment Offices
started by volunteer organizations,
and by various sets Of officials work
ing independently Of each other who
have no experience TO build on and
who do not understand the technique
Of the business. | am reliably in
formed that this latter method is
now being followed in the State Of
New York.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03

workers and farm production is Sc
cured. But we cannot get this or
ganization by letting well-meaning
amateurs organize every variety OF
Agricultural Army" Farm Ser
vice Army" Boys Agricultural
Corps" etc. To build an effective
organization requires technical en-
polvment experts, centralized re-
sponsibility and authority in one Off
cial body, painstaking attention to
details of selecting, recording, and
hiring nen-an enormous amount OF
work. in fact, that takes great deal
Of time and great deal of money.
No results worth while are accom-
plished in ordinary times without
the expenditure of such time, effort
and money. And we must not expect
that in the present war crisis we
shall be able to really effect an in
crease in the labor and food supply
without paying this cost.
The sooner the country learns to
appreciate this truth and to follow
the example Of Ohio in systemati-
cally organizing labor exchanges the
sooner we shall have increased farm
production.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
Rural America
Tense With Wrath

| made to-day Memorial Day ad-
dress to an audience with at least a
thousand farmers and townspeople,
and never a single auditor from any
large city; and l felt a mood that |
have never felt before upon such an
occasion. talked with these men
and women all day. They cheered
every reference 20 the flag as never
before; their habitual stolldity was
all gone, and in its place was an in
tersity Of emotionalsm that was the
hot burning of healthy men in wrath.
The country people are upon the edge
Of fury against foreigners, who, they
believe, have betrayed the nation by
incorporating to their relatives
abroad the supposed heterogenelty Of
Americans and consequent lack Of
genuine love of America. Incident
ally, their fury has spread over into
a burning against all persons sus-
pected of making money out of the
war without giving a full equivalent
in return.
The great city with its exchanges
anc its banks is always a consider
able mystery to the man who does
rot frequently visit it. The canyons
of Wall and Broad streets in New
York give cold chills to the bronzed
men who cheerfully stay outdoors all
day with the thermometer at zero
and a wind blowing.
But in times Of peace these men
Of the fields and of the village stores
lco< upon Chicago and New York
and other comercial certres as in
ovitable Affections to be kept out OF
mind as much as POSSIBLE. Now they
sec them drafting boys into armies
and corn and wheat into elevators.
And they are afraid that the specu-
lator and the capitalist are about to
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
Unshakable Faith
In a Fallacy

It may, Of course, be observed that
ii cities and stock exchanges had no
uses they would disappear, and that
it is fallacious to assume, as the
farmer does, that commerce and
finance in their larger aspects are
burdens upon land and labor. Never
theless, the rural people do believe
that cities and finance are very near
ly waste, if not worse.
But in war time, when all the
world is hungry and i'll clad, these
assumptions and prejudices Of the
rural people are tenfold intensified
by the very appeals made to them by
the people Of the city to produce
more milk, more meat, more hides,
rcre wheat. They answer, as did
one farmer to me to-day, that no
r. after how much the farmers raise
al the profits, all the benefits of war
prices are manipulated into the cof-
fers of the rich men of the cities.
They think that stockbroking is the
main instrument used in this manip-
ulation. The fact that our farmers
are wonderfully prosperous, that
they have automobiles, pianos, cash
in bank as never before, does not af-
feet at all their fixed opinion that
most of the profits have gone TO those
who were already rich or to specu-
lators who are getting rich.
Farmers believe that agriculture is
The basis of all wealth. The fact
That in this age this very war IS
Icing fought to its finish by metal
cut Of mines deep underground, the
fact that the characteristic wealth
Of this age is factory product, not
farm product, subtends but a small
arc in the angle of the vision of the
typical farmer. With certain con-
dcscension, he admits that even the
farmer needs lurlber and steel from
mills; but the tremendous import
Of modern industrial statistics is
shunted off by him with the remark
that the farms produce the real ne
cessaries Of life-food and clothing.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
Many Pledge Signers Fail
To Report for Work

Much has been heard of late Of
modifying high school and college
students, as we'll as business men, to
spend their vacations working on
farms. But those who are familiar
with the conditions know how little
actual farm labor is obtained from
this source compared to the amount
Of effort that is spent in publicity
and speech making. Thousands sign
pledges 10 work on farms, but the
number who actually find their way
to the farm job will not bear inves-
tigation. This work, like every other
that involves connecting man and
job, needs businesslike organization,
and when the Ohio Council of De-
fence set about TO organize this
work and direct it from the central
Office Of its employment system. it
began to get results that cannot be
secured in any other way.
The pledge cards of students from
colleges and universities were dis
tributed to the employment bureaus
located in the districts where the
students wanted to work. The
superintendent of each bureau asks
the student to call and make a de-
tailed application for farm employ
ment; or the registration is sent in
by mail if the applicant lives too
far from the Office. Farm jobs that
are suited to the boys age, ex-
perience and inclination, as ex-
pressed in his application, are re-
ferred TO him from the orders sent
in by farmers. Details of hours Of
labor, nature Of the work. wages
and other conditions, character Of
the farmers family, etc, are ex-
planned to him, and every service is
offered to him that might help him
to accept agricultural employment.
Where this work has been carefully
done substantial numbers Of new
farm workers are actually being Sc
cured from among the schoolboys.
In Ohio the employment bureaus
have placed many students in less
than a month. Where the work has
not been organized in this way, with
definite bargains made through en-
ployment bureaus, few get to the
farms who do not normally spend
their summers on their own or on
relatives farms.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
Farm Hand Has
His Qualifications

To the newspapers and many well
meaning but uniformed enthusi-
asts mobilization Of labor for farm
production requires merely an Office
for correspondence and registration
10 bring farmers and farm hands TO-
gether, or else it means recruiting
an agricultural army" that pre-
sumably will march through the
country doing a little planting here,
harvesting there or fixing up the
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
SPECULATE IN SECURITIES
AND GRAIN SHOULD PROCEED
IN WAR TIME AS IN PEACE
Patriotism MOI Radicalism an Economist Says and We
Ouqht to Assume That Established Methods Of Trading
Are Ethical and Righteous Besides This Is Not the
Time to Experiment with New Schemes

turn their crops, their sons and their
love of country into new fortunes
and into vastly greater power. Such
fear is scarcely a highway to wis
dom.
They mind" when a man buys ten
thousand bushels of wheat at 81 a
bushel and sells them month later
at $2.75; but they can forgive. They
trade in horses and cattle themselves
in the same way. But these rural
pcople resent profits when a man
buys the right to have a million
bushels of wheat and later sells that
right for a great profit, never hav-
ing seen, or intended to see, the real
wheat. They think that they raised
the wheat; that really it is their own
wealth out Of which easy money is
taken.
The farmer believes that he has
more common sense than a score of
city men together; and trading in
futures offends his plainest canons
of common sense, offends his very in
stincts that seize upon facts and
things.
When any one, whether editor or
professor or platform speaker, UNI
dertakes to justify stock speculation
or grain deals that do not involve
handling the real property, to farm
ers or their sons or to other dwellers
in the country, he talks to stone
walls, to wills that will not to under
stand. These people are deaf and
bird to all arguments based upon
averaging out seasonal supplies,
smoothing sharp advances and de-
clines in tangibles and visibles by
puts" and calls" and the like.
September wheat, talked Of in
April, seems as silly to them as the
Imagination of the famous milkmaid
Of the fable of Esop who counted
her chickens before they were
hatched.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03

farms" To the experienced employ
ment agent supplying farmhands is
a serious business that requires skill
and infinite pains and care. 1t
means long and tedious process Of
trying to fit men of doubtful ability
and reputation into a line Of work
that requires every variety Of skill,
and at the same time the man must
be such as to fit properly into the
farmers family. The farm hand
must not only know how to do his
work; he must become a member of
the farmers household, eat at his
table and sleep in his house.
Before a hand can be sent to a
farm there must be clear and def
mite understanding. A process Of
bargaining must be gone through,
contract made. A dozen laborers
can be placed in less than half an
hour, but three or four hours Of a
clerks time in an employment Office
may be taken to place a single farm
hand. Not only must wages, kind Of
work and conditions of employment
be inquired into, but host Of other
questions, some Of them extremely
personal, must be answered before
bargain can be made. Can the
man milk? Has he had experience
On a truck, grain or dairy farm?
Will he fit into a Catholic family?
Is he clean, has he baggage,
change Of clothes? Can he pay his
fare to the farm? Are his habits
such as to make him fit to enter the
family Of a farmer who has young
children? These and many other
questions that must be answered IL
lustrate the difficulties that are over
looked by those who speak and write
of raising agricultural armies as II
il were a matter of Wholesale re-
cruiting.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
Why Patriotic
Intentions Miscarry

If this is the result of the move
ment to organize schoolboys into an
agricultural army, how much less
may we expect Of the movement to
have business men spend a day a
month in helping farmers? 1t seems
almost criminal to spend time, money
and energy in such efforts, when
careful study Of the years Of ex-
perience of employment Offices shows
that the problem must be handled in
another way. If the period for
which business men agree to work on
farms were heightened TO several
weeks or a month or more; if they
registered their experience, age,
health, strength, and other details
1T an employment bureau, and were
put in direct touch with farmers
who came to the bureau TO tell their
needs and complete bargains with
the business men, then a good deal
might be accomplished. Otherwise
all such movements are bound to 90
up in smoke.
Let us not be misled by our en-
thusiasm or our patriotism. We can
not create overnight a new supply
Of farm workers. Business men, stu
dents, and other city people cannot
fit into agricultural employment
simply by signing pledges of patri-
otto intentions to help increase the
food supply. And even if any great
numbers of them were fit for the
work, the real problem is not to get
the men listed, but 10 get them To-
Gated on individual farms. Here is
where careful and efficient organiza-
ton is needed organization that
covers every state and the nation as
a whole. And in charge Of the or
Fanization there must be men Of ex-
perience, tact, skill, and knowledge.
Such an organization must be
formed, will be formed. before any
appreciate increase in agricultural
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
Why Capital Is
Feared and Admired

The fear of the capitalist Is OF MS
mower; in war, it is the fear lest
he shall not do his full duty toward
the land that has made HIM rich'
The admiration Of the capitalist Is
OF his strong grip upon reality, upon
affairs, upon the possessions and
the conduct Of other men. The fear
OF the Spectator, whether IN STOCKS
or in farms or in factories or IN
eh,ns. is fear of misuse, abuse and
souandering of already realized
wealth. The admiration of nm Is
admiration of his adventuring all
thar he has upon a throw and oil
his occasional great winnings by
wL.ch he creates for himself, and
perhaps for a considerable number
Of other men, even an entire nation
2 new situation that is far better
than the old.
Now the change in the public
mood. as seen from the interior oil
the country, is a change from a com
Portable anticipation of peace with
prosperity for many a year, no mat
ter into what wretchedness the rest
OF the world might be cast, into an
opriops certainty that upon rs m
the main depends 'chether or not inc
,royId. ,gitk ourselves M II, shall DC
,oboybarizcd. Let the man OF the
GREAT city make no mistake upon
tlis point: the farmer of the coun-
try and the small tradesman OF the
town are as fully aware of the mean
ing of the forcing Of America into
this awful maelstrom as ne is. In
deed. the farmer and the tradesman
see their boys in the fight and their
incomes conscripted; and, being at
heart and in will far more indepen-
dent than the man of the city, they
take their own lot to-day more griev-
ouslv than does the man Of the city,
and not less resolutely for the war.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03

1t is not true that the America,
farmer is loath to undertake ener.
getically the business Of greatly in.
cleasing the agricultural productioo
Of the land this year. Far from Il
At least in Northern 0hio-and 7
have been in seventeen different
counties in the past two weeks "a
Judge the matter-everywhere inten.
sive agricultural, superior soil prem
aration, increased acreage under The
plough, vastly increased acreage in
gardens, constitute the order Of the
times. But the farmer hopes to get
for himself greatly increased fnan.
:ial return. He thinks that if wheat
is $3.50 in July but So in February
his class should have the gain, no,
capitalists or spectators.
Consequently, the legislators Of the
land will be pressed upon this year
by the rural voters for any and every
kind of reform legislation, from the
levying of taxes TO the prohibition Of
dealing in futures, perhaps even 70
the closing Of stock exchanges. The
one political question will be as to
the strength of this rural pressure
as compared with the resistance Of
the wealthier classes Of the city, TO.
gether with the problematic disposi.
ton Of the wage-earniHg mechanics
and clerks Of the cities in the con.
troversy. Recently we have seen a
railroad contest between owners and
superior employees in which the latter
came off decidedly ahead.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
May Result in
Adverse Legislation

The pressure Of this upon the
legislation that we are sure to see
offered in the course of the long war
that lies ahead Of US is obvious. The
proposed restrictions upon stock
trading, and grain as well, arise
from the large rural constituencies
Of cur national and state legislators.
Complaints only make the prejudices
stronger.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
Labor Bureaus Must
Be Modified

It is only by work Of this kind
that the supply Of farm workers can
be Immediately increased to speed up
farm production. Not an organiza-
ton Of an army Of farm workers,
but an organization Of state systems
Of efficient employment bureaus will
give us the results. Supplying farm
labor is primarily a matter Of max
ing thousands Of individual labor
bargains, for the average farm is
small and the farmer needs not a
gang, but one or two men.
If every state followed the lead Of
Ohio and Wisconsin and organized
systems Of employment bureaus COW
ering their whole territory, with ac-
tive, efficient men in charge, and the
United States government set IN n
national bureau 70 unite and Co
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
History Made
While You Wait

We are now making political his
tory so fast that events forerun the
publication of prophecies. We have
seen, through the past several weeks,
declines of railroads and Of many
industrials, with marked advances Of
a few industrials. We are watching
earnestly the selling campaign for
the Liberty Bonds TO see whether the
moneys paid for them represent
economies or sales Of other securi-
ties. Especially, we are watching
the process Of the war-economy hys-
terra, which forgets that rapidity Of
circulation of currency and Of credit
is as important a factor in prosperity
as is the per capita amount Of
moneys.
There is something here deeper
than conventional patriotism, and
this something is a fundamental
sense Of the truth that the most ter
1iblc damage that q great war can
infict upon q people is to unsettle
t,eir habits Of thought and conduct
regarding property and production.
The man who looks upon war time
as the best time when to exploit
some hypothesis Of his own for re-
form, be he farmer or banker, be he
scientist or politician, be he labor
leader or Spectator himself, is
dangerous enemy Of the common.
wealth. So far as possible we ought
TO stick to our habits Of economic en-
deavor, to our familiar laws, to our
ancient justice, 20 the common ways;
We should resist innovations, includ-
ing even parsimony. On the con-
trary, sound patriots should assume
thar the methods and principles that
have enabled us to build up such vast
wealth, such enyiable social relations
among our citizenship urban and
rural, and so stout a national mo-
rality should be reverenced in these
trying days Of war and continued
if possible, till It's very end N the
triumph That our democracy will pay
for, if need be, with all rs riches and
with all the required lives.
Patriotism has faith in the customs
ard institutions that have bred IL
Patriotism is never radicalism. II
is tolerant and optimistic. Here we
assume all the accused innocent IN
til proven guilty beyond a reasonable
doubt. We Americans ought TO De
patriotic enough TO assume taa'
stock and grain dealing as well as
land holding and merchandising are
ethical and righteous, and save per-
haps in slight details, should pro-
ceed in war time as in peace accord.
ing to the familiar methods unV'
some particular item in these nie'A'
DDS has been proven conclusively TO
be guilty Of injury 10 the common
welfare.
| believe that the ablest OF ths
rural men Of America at heart agree
that peace is q far better time ina"
war to determine the ethics Of traas
and speculation.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
Wisconsin Bureau
Places Many Foreigners

1t is surprising, however, how
much can be done toward supplying
the farmers need for labor when
the work is properly conducted as a
skilled business in efficient employ
ment bureaus. In Wisconsin, where
a plan similar to that Of Ohio is now
being organized, they have had an
experience which shows the results
concretely. There, as elsewhere,
farmers complained Of their inabil-
ity to get help, and what they did
obtain was floating labor, inefficient
and unreliable. The Milwaukee Pub
lie Employment Bureau determined
to make a special effort to meet the
farm labor problem. Agents were
sent all over the state TO discuss with
farmers organizations the labor
needs of their districts and the
means of supplying those needs. It
was explained TO the farmers that
they cannot expect to get expert or
skilled American farm hands. These
were positively not to be had. But
an effort would be made TO get for
eigners, men who had been raised on
farms in the Old Country, but who
did not know our ways or our Ian
guage. If the farmers would be
patient with these people and try to
teach them both the work and the
language, they could probably get
a supply of good workers.
And so it actually happened. In
various districts men We're selected
to act as agents for the Milwaukee
bureau. Sometimes it was an officer
of a grange or other farmers or
ganization, sometimes it was the
cashier of a country bank, a priest,
a county clerk-any one who had the
time and the interest 20 do the work.
In the employment Office an inter-
prefer was employed and special
efforts were made 10 get in touch
with immigrant wage-workers.
Leaders of the various nationalities
were interviewed, articles were pub
lished in foreign language publica-
tons, and every facility was used to
advertise the efforts of the bureau to
place men on farms.
At the end Of a year it was ap-
parent that the supply Of farm
workers could be greatly increased
by businesslike organization Of labor
exchanges of this kind. Whereas the
Milwaukee bureau had been accus-
toned to placing two or three hun
dred men a year on farms, this year
showed between two and three thou
sand farm hands placed.
New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-06-03
By WILLIAM ESTABROOk CHAN
CELLOR,

Head of the Department of Economies,
Politics and Sociology, College OIL
Wooster
-HE capitalist has made the
world market; and the spec
Il ulative business man mas
been the most important of all agents
in world politics for two tnousahu
years and more. Wherever anu
whenever they have moved they nave
encountered resistance from the con-
sa~vativcs and from the reformerS
Cor opposite reasons. What Is pass
in, in the American social mind no"
as TO their various activities does
NOT differ in kind from what has al
vavs passed hitherto. Fear and ad-
n,iration are the tributes paid by the
general public to the investor ana
the Spectator alike.
We have been astonlshlngly
changed in public mood since the
European war began in 1914, ana
we have been again changed since
our own entrance into that war this
wear. The total change amounts to
transformation, to a revolution; but
in if. Notwithstanding, there are APP
narent the old emotions toward the
man of great property and toward
inc man of effective enterprise.