Morris tribune., 1919-12-19
SUPPOSE THE FARMER SHOULD
STRIKE
CONTINUED from Page g.

meat, milk, cheese, butter, eggs-in
short. all foodstuffs-and with that
to determine whether or not the
worlds table will be abundantly sup
piled next year.
THE American farmer. is willing
to meet the issue squarely. If prices
cut to the bone all along the line
farm products, wages, manufactured
goods, rent, wholesalers and retail
ers' profits-will bring the desired
result, he will go as far along the
road as any-but he will not go
alone. If increased production will
clarity the situation, the Am
erican farmer will jointly, with
all his fellow citizens, buckle
his belt for a most strenuous
campaign of production here
again he is determined that he will
not work alone.
eff capita1istic monopoly wants
enough food produced that it may
be Toasted; if organized labor wants
enough food produced that it may be
fed; if the do-nothing dawdlers want
enough food so that they may oc-
casionally eat, let them stand forth
now at this time, when the farmer
must determine his 1920 fOod-pro-
duction program. and declare by
deeds-cutting out prof1teering in
goods and wages, going honestly to
the job Of doing a full days work
for a full days pay-their willing
ness to cooperate.
Failure of these forces to do this
now will be boomerang that ere the
next cycle of the seasons will effect a
condition of living now undreamed."
In other words, the farmers have
served an ultimatum on both capital
and labor that reduction of the cost
of living does not and shall not mean
alone a reduction of the basic prices
of food produced on the farms. It
means something quite different from
that.
During the Iowa State Fair at Des
Moines this year a day was given
over to the State Farm Bureau Fed
Grafton and at big tent mass meet
ing 1 heard ]. R. Howard, president
of the federation, tell the Iowa farm
ers about his trip to Washington.
He related to them in homely but
President and Congress and what b al
been the results.
He made plain, too, that what had
been said we're not idle words but
IN fC ho+ hn no
by the farmers at home. A year ago
they would have been idle words; to-
day, with the farmers organized into
county and state farm bureaus and
steps being taken that will soon
bring a national organization, the
farmers are in a place where they
can begin to do just what they want
to do
Give the farm-bureau declarations
another six months and they will be
in a place to WELD as much power
and just as effectively for the farmers
as the American Federation of Labor
does for the laboring man today.
That this is true is reflected in the
call sent out by President Wilson in
September to consider the railroad
question-he sent not only for cap
ital and labor but for farm repre-
sentatives as we'll.
Down there at Washington, where
Congress was fioundering round try
ing to solve this high-cost-of living
mess it was a case of passing the
buck" Mr.. Howard went on to say
after he told of his experiences.
Capital passed it to labor, labor to
capital and both to the middleman,
and everyone was passing it to the
farmer.
1--WE believe the time has come
for the farmer to do some passing
himself. Take labor, for instance.
For years the laboring man in the
city has been demanding more and