Bonners Ferry herald. [volume] (Bonners Ferry, Idaho) 1904-current, 1921-03-01
SHOT NO. BY A SNIPER in THE
LAST DITCH
The Spirit of Cooperation.

NO plan, no profit, no amount of
talk can take the place of the true
cooperative spirit. You can lie awake
nights to offer excuses, and take long
trips to conventions to get plans,
but there is one word-only one word
that really spells success from
cooperative standpoint, and that is
the spirit of cooperation. 1t is the
spirit of neighborliness among farm
ers. 1t is the "help-you" spirit, the
'boost-each-other" spirit the chip
ping in" spirit 1t is the spirit of
cheerfulness and helpful kindness, of
which no man can have too much.
and most men have too little.
We read great deal about i'm
proving the condition of the farmer;
socially, rural uplift, rural sanitation
etc. When the farmer solves the
problem of improving his financial
condition he can solve the social
phase himself.
In all lines of business and industry
excepting agriculture only there is a
steady tendency towards unification.
The short lines of railway OF 40
years ago are now connected in con-
tinental systems, and the manufactur-
ing plants scattered over the country
have united their management under
nationwide trusts The purpose of
this movement is to regulate produc
ton. to reduce operating expenses,
and to eliminate competition in sales
Agriculture is the only large occu-
patton of men which is now left to
be regulated by the chance of supply
and demand.
The consequence of this world
movement is that the farmer pur-
chases his supplies and sells his pro-
duce in a market controlled by or
CARNATIONS the most powerful the
world has ever known Not only this
but there has grown up between the
farmer and the manufacturer of his
necessities on the one hand and the
consumer of his products on the other
a system under which an undue share
/ of the product of his labor is taken
to themselves by distributing agencies
The great corporations which now
control our transportation and manu-
| featuring industries are possible only
| through cooperation The thousands
of shareholders in such a corporation
have simply joined hands in a united
effort to produce a great result, and
Iif the farmers are to improve their
condition it must be done through the
same method
4 Farmers possess once each year all
of the farm crops-the food of the peO-
| pie of the nation, and the cotton and
wool which clothes the people, and
great quantities for export to other
countries. What the farmer produces
is absolutely necessary to the well
fare, comfort and existence of humans
and the domestic animals of the world
Consumers cannot do without what
the farmer produces single day. If
the farmers would stop marketing
the whole country would be thrown
in panic in week, or the farmers
prices would be paid. Yet strange to
say in the movement of that product
from the farmer to the consumer
which takes place every year, neither
has a voice in fixing the price or its
value.
Better marketing conditions and
adequate credit facilities will come in
this country only when the American
farmer acts for himself in advocating
! legislation to foster and provide new
economic machinery. The government
can act but does not. The farmer
must act.
Somewhere in between the producer
and the consumer there is an agency
a force. not regulated by law of sup
ply and demand nor any human law
call it what you please-the specuIat-
or, the manufacturer, the jobber,
transportation, the retailer-alone or
in combination-that has been charged
with being the cause of all farmer
misery.
In every state and county of this
nation there is a monster movement
the Farm Bureau-now being mobi-
/ liked to crush out and forever break
the chains of financial slavery.
This is the monster that affrights
the hardened soul of bounty fed
avarice, born OF the cruel necessities
of war and kept alive by the venal
forces of corruption and greed. 1t is
the inexorable spirit of Justice which
seems TO say to this blind and brutal
force, Choose for your executioner
Me or the Mob"
GEO IRVING,
Pres. Boundary County Farm Bureau
c. w. II. HEIDEMAN,
Sec. Boundary County Farm Bureau