The National leader., 1922-01-09

q nIM nesota made a speech in the East, to
lKaNad Is meeting Of insurance men. He vgor-
|SSassl @ ousy condemned the idea of the state
|I@ 1 entering into any kind of business,
particularly the insurance business,
because he was talking to insurance men. He said
this in spite of the fact that the state Of Mime
sofa FOR YEARS has been engaged in the insur-
ance business it's own hook, and has been very
SUCCESSFUL at it. Instead of letting private
insurance companies insure public buildings in
Minnesota city, county and state, the state nsures
them itself, and saves thousands of dollars year.
Governor Preus didn't tell the insurance men
about this successful state insurance in his own
state.
Governor Preus, to prove state insurance was
all wrong, attempted to amend the American Dec
laration of Independence and Constitution!
large order, certainly! Where these documents
mention "life, liberty and pursuit Of happiness"
Mr.. Preus said that what really meant
"Lfe, liberty and pursuit of PRIVATE PROPER
TY." Thus, he pointed out, fundamental law
is against the state going into any kind of business
particularly the insurance business! This pleased
the assembled insurance men greatly.
Why are Governor Preus and insurance men gen.
orally so opposed to any kind of state insurance?
State insurance means depriving army of in
surance brokers of huge, unnecessary commissions
It also means depriving number of great private
corporations, now having monopoly on the in
surance business, of large and unnecessary profits
All these unnecessary profits and dividends and
commissions come out of the pockets of the people,
Governor Preus and the insurance men are afraid
the people Will wake up to this 1acC. But Cne peO-
pie WILL wake up when they understand how
cessful one kind of state insurance has been in
North Dakota. To tell about that is the object of
this article
For 10 years before the Nonpartisan league came
along the North Dakota farmers clamored for state
hail insurance. Crop losses through hail heavy
nearly every year in the state and farmers object
ed to paying unreasonably high premiums to pri-
vate corporations for hail protection. They knew
that other countries had successful state insur-
ance, which saved the people great sums of money.
The demand for state hail insurance finally became
so great that the politicians then in charge of the
state had to act They did what they usually do in
such cases. They had the legislature pass make
shift state hail insurance law, which became et-
fective in 1911.
so that state hail insurance wouldn't be success.
It didn't provide for the only RIGHT kind of state
insurance, the sem-compulsory plan. It
voluntary" plan, and did not put up any adequate
competition against the old line insurance COM
panies. The obstacles and restrictions in the law
made it certain it would fail. This the inten-
tion The politicians, faithful to big business in the
idea that the state must NEVER be permitted to
go into ANY kind of business, wanted the law to
fail.
Then they could say:
"See, you silly farmers, state hail insurance is a
failure! Why do you demand such foolish things?
Don't do it again. Let us pass laws that are good
for you, and don't listen TO those nasty socialistc
agitators any more"
POLITICIANS HAIL INSURANCE LAW
WAS BIG FAILURE FROM START
That's what they expected to say, after the mis-
cradle failure of the state hail law they had passed
was known to everybody. But in the meantime
something happened, and the politicians never got
chance to say that. The Nonpartisan league came
on the scene.
The hail law of the politicians had collected only
$261O9.44 in premiums to pay losses in 1911. The