The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1920-10-21
Crushing Me Farmer
BY WILLIAM ALLEN wHIrE.


Society in the last two decades in the
middle west, particularly, has been
slowly crushing the American farmer.
What New England did in the last
part OF the nineteenth century We of
the middle west, particularly of Kan
sas, are doing now to the mid-western
farms. The industrial wave of the
nation is moving rapidly westward.
High wages, high prices, high rent
make dear land and as a result farm
,tenantry is increasing by terrible leaps
and bounds all over the Missouri vail
ley Kansas in the last decade has
seen thousands OF farms all but akRn-
doned, for too many tenanted fafms
are so impoverished and rundown
that the next step is abandonment.
And all this is because. with the grad
ual encroachment of industry in
American life, we have been robbing
the American farmers. The Republic
can platform expresses the feeling
that something must be done for the
farmers. So does the Democratic plat
form. So does the Socialist platform
Harding has said that the farmer is in
a class by himself and must have spe-
cial consideration from the govern
ment and from the American people.
Cox has said the same thing, virtually.
The farmer must have special conSid-
eratipn from the American. people.
He cannot grow crops profitable to-
day upon high priced land with high
priced labor and high rates of inter-
est.
The father, who owns the lands,
may get along. But the son who owns
no land and the farmer tenant cannot
thrive. In the industrial world move,
the young farmer and the tenant quit
making food and begin making things.
And so all food products are high and
must remain high.
The people of Kansas this year have
an opportunity to help the Kansas
farmer. An amendment to the Kan
sas Constitution is being submitted.
amendment No. (which permits
the legislature of Kansas to set aside
special fund which may be used for
the purchase of land. The land, under
the amendment. may be sold to- the
landlesS farmer. He does not have
to have any part of the purchase price
down. His Kansas blood and Kan
sas energy and his Kansas ambition
are regarded sufficient collateral.
But he occupies and tills the farm
which remains the property of Kansas
until it is all paid for in small pay
ments distributed over a long time at
nominal rate of interest. This re-
moves one handicap from the Kansas
farmer; 1t removes the handicap of
high interest and high rates of rent.
If Amendment No. 1 is passed the Kan
sas boy who now leaves the Kansas
farm to go into a garage or go out
of the state to work in a factory, can
find enough land to work to keep him
in funds, he can rear his family, he will
not have to worry about rent or high
rates of interest. And Kansas will
hold its boys in the business of max
ing food rather than in the business of
food consumption. This is no new
and radical proposal. 1t has been
tried in several states and in several
Anglo-Saxon countries. And always
it has succeeded.
This proposition would give the
10 a l6cc ifrr 70
q home and a farm for himself; the
proposition is the answer which mod
ern industrial society must make to
the steadily increasing abandoned
farms and tenant farms of the middle
west. In Kansas more than half the
farms are tenant farms; and tenant
farm does not yield as well as a farm
owned by the farmer. This has great
| ly decreased our annual output OF
foodstuffs and that again tends to
make food prices high. 1t is the duty
and obligation of every citizen of Kan
sas to vote for Amendment No. l.. 1t
| is the first step toward reducing the
/ high cost of living. 1t is the first step
toward making Kansas a larger and
| better state During the decade now
| passing We gained only about $4,000
people. There were three or four
| times that many babies born in the
| state, but as fast as babies are born,
young men and young women move
| out. Something must be done to keep
them at home, something that will
help to put them on farms. And there
l is only one way under heaven to put
them on Kansas farms if they have
no money and that is for the people
of Kansas to furnish them credit, and
that credit, with the collateral of good
Kansas blood and educational train
| ing is the only way on earth to make
them stay A vote for Amendment No.
| 1 is a vote for a better state of Kan
sas. A vote against it is vote for
high prices of food and a great area
of wasting land.