The Wolf Point herald. (Wolf Point, Mont.) 1913-1940, 1922-01-05
Dearborn independently

q Cft1 4 dl1C d1C cQLl
a crisis fifty years ago; so did Eng
land; and in each of those cases the
trouble was due to causes like those
which are now coming to a focus in
this country. The chief cause was
and is concentrating IN the growth
of what we call business and industry
to the exclusion of agriculture. When
| say business and industry certain
things come to your mind as symbols
of what the words mean. These SYM
bols are factories, stores, warehous-
es, perhaps ships and railroads and
mines. The words don't suggest
farming, for they haven't and don't
yet mean farming. 1t a be cor
rected only by bringing farming into
the group of activities you think of
in terms of business and industry.
For farming is now as much of a bus
mess or industry as any of the others
so viewed and treated by the nation"
The speaker was DR.. E. F. Ladd,
new United States Senator from
North Dakota. DIR. Laid is not by
occupation a farmer, but his election
was due distinctly to the demand Of
the farmers of his state that they
have in the United States Senate a
spokesman who could talk with abso-
lutte authority. Not the authority,
merely, of an official commission, nor
even that of the pillow handles or the
ritchfork, but of scientific knowledge
of the problems of agriculture. 1t
probably has been a long time since
DR.. Laid rode a harvester, grasped
the handle Of a hoe, or ever looked
after blowing up a field. Yet for
twenty-five years or more he has
been accepted as an authority, be-
yond probably any working farmer,
agriculture. What he knows has
been gained by lifelong laboratory
studies out of reach of the man who
must make his living in the fields.
For many years he was head of the
North Dakota Agricultural College,
and in addition to looking after the
training given youths, he carried on
fight after fight for the farmers and
the public generally of his section.
'In the last quarter of a century"
he said to the writer, 81 haven't gone
to bed a single night without being
a defendant in n of more court
fights arising from my work. Among
] have on my hands just s54t
A libel suit for one hundred thousand
dollars. In no case, so far, has the
final court decision been against me-"
The doctor has had tugs of war with
of the big trusts, for he was
.ne of the earliest advocates of laws
crimps into monopolies, and
protecting the public against such
things as impure foods. He was n
IF President Roosevelt's advisors In
The pure food fight of fifteen years
ago. Being a chemist as well as an
economist of wide fame, he has some
lines even been summoned abroad
% give expert advice on food prob
ems, as in the fight ver bleached
lour in England.
His Coming Pleases Senate
Oddly, DR.. Laid is one of only a
few men of science ever elected
% Congress and probably the only
me of his type ever to sit in the I'm
ted States Senate. Though his
election was due to the Non-Partisan
league, the run of even the most
conservative Senators viewed with
pleasure his coming to Congress. For
whatever you may say about 1T in
,ther respects, Congress always has
warm welcome for the mar who
,nows what he is talking about, ever
hough the bulk of other members
agree with all he has to say.
And those who know look upon DR..
add as such a man. Hence to a.
.xtent greater than has been the case
With any Senator of the past, DR..
add is likely to be accepted as the
enatorial spokesman and authority
or the farmers of the country. Dur
ng most of an afternoon of one of
lie iISI lays iC opChS a. q oShh"eNi
It the capital, DR.. Laid talked over
With the writer the problems of ag-
iculture as he sees them. There was
me striking thing about the way he
Iealt with the subject. Rarely was
le local and then for purposes of
Illustration only. Behind what he
aid, there was clearly a national,
ven an international conception of
he subject.
"Just as farming is no longer a
calling to which a person is
torn, it can no longer be viewed as
local, or state, or, in many senses,
national subject alone" he said,
What the farmer of Australia is
Ding is of big Importance to the
of North Dakota. Likewise
ne cotton farmer in the South has
ital interest in what the Egyptian
elijah on the Nile or the Hindoo on
ne Gauges is doing. For a big or
short crop of wheat in Australia
r the Argentine, or, in normal
- Prcc,o MO ,noon ubotbor