The Lambertville record. [volume] (Lambertville, N.J.) 1872-1968, 1918-03-28
THE WAR, The FARM,
AND The FARMERS
BY HERBERT QUICK.


The farmer everywhere loves peace
The American farmer especially loves
peace. But the farmer everywhere is
a warrior when war is the only thing
which will make and keep him free
either a warrior or serf. The farm
ers are sometimes the last to heat up.
But they stay hot, and in long fight
they are always found sturdily carry
ing the battle across No Mans Land
to the foe in the last grim struggle.
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 victory
which we fondly believed we had twice
won in the past.
This war was at first hard to under
stand 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 unfa
miliar q guise. We did not then know
that monster has arisen with a thou
sand arms, who could reach across the
seas and could take from us three
fourths of everything We grew without
our being aware of it and could follow
up his robbery with invasion, subjuga
ton and national death.
The Hand of kairserism.
If the imperial German government
had made and enforced an order that
no American farmer should leave his
own land, that he could not haul a load
of grain or drive a head of stock to
town--if, In fact, the Kaiser had laid
an interdict on all intercourse between
farm and farm and between farm and
towp-he would have done only lit
tie more than he accomplished by his
lnterdict against American farmers
use of the sea.
When the war broke out through ter
ror and surprise and panic we gave up
for awhile the use of the sea as a
highway. To q great extent we gave
Ii up And so long as we gave it up
we, the farmers of America, were ruin
ed. When we finally rallied and set
once more in motion the ships of the
world prosperity returned to the farms
of America
Why did we draw the sword? Was
it to keep up the price of wheat and
cotton and to protect trade only? If
some one should order you to remain
on your farm and not to use the public
highways would your resistance be
based only on the fear of loss in prop
erty, the profits from failure to market
your crops, the Inconvenience in not
being able to buy your supplies in
town. BY no means You would fight
to the last gasp, not to make money,
but to be free.
War Against Slavery.
When a man is enslaved all he loses
in money is his wages. But the white
man has never been able to accept
slavery for that reason.
What the imperial German govern
ment offered the farmers of America in
it's ruthless submarine warfare was not
the loss of profits, but slavery to the
saber RATHER of Potsdam. He pur-
posed to make us slaves by numbering
the people who take our products to
market.
are fighting. If we had not declared
war, but had accepted the conditions
of life ordered for us by the Kaiser,
we should today be poverty stricken
people, our factories shut down, our
workmen unemployed, our people
starving, our farmers ruined by the
poverty of those for whose consump-
ton we grew our crops.
Every farmer in the United States
must remember that the war has a
Grst mortgage on every cent he has.
Our contribution is, first, our sons
and brothers for the trenches; second,
the last pound of food products which
we can grow by mobilizing our labor
supply, utilizing the men, women, chill
dren and the townspeople about us,
and, third, money for Liberty Bonds.