The Marietta journal and courier., 1918-06-21
THE WAR, THE FARM,
AND THE FARMER.

The farmer everywhere loves
peace. The American farmer espec-
tally loves peace. Since the dawn of
history, the farmer has been the man
who suffered most from war. All he
possesses lies out of doors in plain
sight,, and is spoil of war-his house,
his grain, his live stock. He knows
that he pays the price of war Sin
steer and gear and stack, and that
the flames that light the skies in the
rear of every invading army are con-
Stunning the things that yesterday rep
resented his life work, and the life
labors of past generations Of farmers
the little coral islands of comfort
and wealth that decades of toll on the
farm builds up.
But the farmer everywhere is a
warrior when war is the only thing
which will make and keep him free
warrior or a serf He can not raj
ly to the colors as quickly as can the
dwellers of the cities, because it takes
longer to send to the farms than to
the cities the fiery cross of the call
to arms. 1t takes longer to call the
farmers from the fields than the city
dwellers from the shops; for many
do not hear the first blast of the
trumpet, and others do not at first
understand it's meaning because they
have not had the time. * i
The work of the fields, the care of
the livestock, and the mud and sTush
of the long road to town are all OBJ
stacles to that sudden rush of news
which sometimes carries the cities
away in mad outbursts of excitement.
1t is impossible to set the farmers
of the United States on fire bymeans
of any sudden spark of rumor. y
But when the farmers do ignite
they burn with slow hot fire which
nothing can put out. They are some
times the last to heat up, but they
stay hot, and in long fight they are
always found sturdily carrying the
battle across No Mans Land to the
foe in the last grim struggle.
They fight slow rear-guard ac-
ton that covers retreat in disaster,
and their stubborn valor always helps
to turn the tide toward victory in the
final triumph.
The American farmer will give all
that he has, and all that he is, to win
this great war against war, this enor-
nous struggle to win again the victo-
ry which we fondly believed we had
twice won in the past.
This war was first hard to under
stand. No armed foe invaded the
United States. The night fires were
not redeemed by the burning byres
and farmsteads of America. No raid
ing parties harried us of our cattle
or horses. No saber rattlers insulted
our women. 1t seemed to many of
us that we were not at war. The
thing was so far off, and it came to
us in so unfamiliar guise. We did
not then realize what giant war has
become.
We did not then know that mon
ster has arisen with thousand arms
who could reach across the seas and
take from us three-fourth of every
thing we grew without our being a
ware of it, and could follow up his
robbery with invasion, subjugatlon
and national death. We did not at
first realize this, but finally we saw
that it was so.
If the Imperial German govern
noent had made and enforced an order
that no American farmer should
leave his own land, that he conld not
haul load of grain, or drive head
of stock to town-if in fact theKalser
had laid an interdict on all intercourse
between farm and farm, and between
farm and town, he would have done
onlv little more than he accomplish
ed bv his interdict against American
farmers use of the sea. What was
the order against which we rebelled
when we went into this war? Look
at the condition of the American far
mer in the latter part of 1914 and
the first half of 1915 and see.
When the war broke out, through
terror and surprise and panic we
gave up for a while, the use OF the
sea as a highway.
To a great extent we gave 1t up.
And so long as we gave 1t up, we
the farmers of America were ruined.
l know an Iowa farmer who sold
his 1914 crop of $4,000 bushels of
wheat for 70 cents a bushel. Far
mers in the south sold their cotton Tor
half the cost of producing 1t. All tins
time those portions of the world
whose ports were open were ready 10
nav almost any price for our prod
,,ro llty llIpd and