The Miller press. [volume] (Miller, S.D.) 190?-current, 1922-06-15

mind OF America,
You cannot find -such wonderfully
inspired thoughts as that emanatins from
the crowded, congested districts OF tene-
ment quarters. This Is the inspiration
and the dream Of the man who lived out
doors, who co-operated with his neighbor,
who was not elbowed about and embar-
raised by people ~jostling him about. He
thought along the lines Of the posterity
and the farmers Of America-ninety-6ve
per cent Of the people living In America
at that time were farmers. They made
possible this Republic Of the United States
of America.
The Farmers Part.
They fought the wars. The monu-
ments In Lexington and Concord, dedl.
Gated to the memory Of those who fought,
are statues Of stalwart, husky farm boys.
Washington, Monroe, Jefferson and John
Hancock lived On the farm. John Han
cock lived on the farm and was the head
of the Supreme Court; he was truly a
farmer. Our Constitution 10 purely the
contribution Of the farmers mind.
After launching the Ship OF State, one
thing happened which possibly changed
the entire trend and thought of the
United States-the discovery OF the steam
engine, which made possible central fac
tories in central points, and then there
came the controversies OF the man who
owned the machine and the man who
operated the machine, and the contro-
versy has continued between the mar
who owned the machine and the man who
operated the machine until the problems
of capital and labor have been solved far
in advance of those of agriculture.
I'VE have had the problems of a~gricul-
ture facing rs since the Revolutionary
War, but instead Of solving them and
fighting them out and occupying the CEN
ter of the stage as has labor and capital,
agriculture has gradually retreated from
those problems. If the agriculturist has
had an acute problem in Kentucky, he
retreated to Ohio, and the expansive ter
ritory offered to the people OF America
has afforded relief to the agriculturist in
these economic problems and has delayed
the solution of these problems possibly Is
years. The capital invested in a%gricul-
ture ia so strong that If the farmers should
sell out, they could buy with that money
in hand all of the railroads Of the United
States, all of the manufacturing plants,
and then the next rs biggest industries of
the United States. That is merely repre-
senting the capital invested.
A Washington Conference.
1--WE had a conference last April in
Washington-our Executive Commit
tee of the American Farm Bureau FEEDER
ation-and we invited to this conference
representatives from every state in the
and we asked them questions. What is
Tho I,fr1,,It,, yx;fh aor;o,,1t,xa a., o,,~ ~o.&
of the country? And they brought in va
were affecting agriculture In that part OF
the country, and we, after a careful analy-
sis, were able to group them under prac-
tically four neutrality-suspicious.. diff
Guilty, a financial difficulty, a marketing
Allied then and closely identified with
which you could subdivide those heads,
but those were the chief problems.
What do you consider is necessary in
a legislative way to correct these difficult
ties? They outlined a program then to
session. The Agricultural Bloc came
into being.
The Distribution Cost.
I'm dining with Secretary Wallace and
Mr.. Hoover, and two or three more men,
bers of that like standing, this point was
brought up for discussion. Under our
present methods of transportation today,
the center of production of the United
States is about at St. Louis, Missouri; the
center of consumption 10 near Philadel-
phia in Pennsylvania. Under our pres
ent methods Of distribution Il costs more
to take food assembled at St. Louis to
Philadelphia than it does to 90 down to
Argentine Republic or New Zealand and
deliver that same amount of food TO
Philadelphia.
There are tremendous responsibilities
placed upon the people of the United
States; not agriculturists alone, but every
body identified with agriculture is inter
ested in the correct solution Of these
problems, and there never was a time in
the civilization of society where there we're
more people looking towards the United
States for the standard by which they
shall standardize their type CT ~civiliza-
ton at this time. When l look over this
whole country with that view, it seems
to me there never was a call SO great as
that upon the people Of America today
to act in a cooperative, friendly, patri-
otto spirit to solve some Of these problems.
The Farm Bureau has undertaken &c
solve these problems for farmers as a
class. 1t is the farmer organized. And
organized, he can do through his organ
~ization, the Farm Bureau. what, IL he at
tempted singiy, would result in miser-
able failure"
A pair Of mems shoes weighs three
pounds and is priced at $10.s0. A cow
hide weighs hfty-hve pounds and the
price today is even cents per pound. A
farmer hauls hides to town and offers to
trade them to the s~torekeeper for shoes.
II the storekeeper takes him up on the
basis Of present prices the farmer finds
that he is not strong enough to carry