Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1922-01-25
PRESIDENTS DRIVE
UPON BLOC FAILS
Attempt to Bring Farmers Back
to Party Through Confer
ence Is Futile
RADICAL PROGRAM LOOMS
By CLINTON w. GILBERT
stan Correspondent Evening Public Ledger


stan Correspondent Evening Public Ledger
Copvrioht. 1929. bv Public Ledger Company
Washington. Jan. 25.---1f the Presi-
dent called this farm conference to win
the farmers away from the farm bloc
and back to the Republican party, as
his speeches since it began indicate,
he has not succeeded. The effect of the
conference is to strengthen the bloc and
to move the bloc farther over toward
radicalism.
Before the meeting Is over there will
be q resolution passed with a whoop
indorsing the bloc Whatever factions
there are in the conference. they are
all for the farm bloc. Radicals and
conservatives alike are agreed upon hav-
ing representation in Congress which
will be independent of party control.
/ The only difference among them is as to
the program which is to be laid out for
them by the cmbattled farmers.
! The net effect of the conference will
( be to present to the country a plan
/ Of action for the farmers much more
/ advanced than the Administration de-
! sires.
Will Give Bloc an Excuse
/ The Senators and Representatives from
agricultural States will be able to
point TO their orders from the farmers
/ assembled in convention by the Admin
| istration when the party leaders call
upon them in the name of party 10y
/ atty.
| The conference is unQuestionably con-
! servative as farm opinion goes, but how
| much farther advanced 1t Is than the
/ Republican party may be seen by the
action which the subcommittees on
/ transportation took last night in adopt
/ ing resolutions favoring the repeal of
the Esch- Cummins Law guarantee of
railroad earnings and restoration of
power over rates to the State Railroad
| Commissions. These resolutions went
through by low vote, L. to ;. in one
! instance and IL to ) in the other.
although a railroad president, Mark
ham, of the Illinois Central, sat in the
committee.
Radicals to Have Say
And VIXEN the conservative majority
Of the conference has adopted it's reSo-
lutions, the agricultural editors here
will meet and say that the program
does not go far enough, outlining their
own more radical program. Then the
more radical organizations here, the
farmers union and the society OF
equity, will meet and put out the mi
nority reports of the various commit
tees here as their program.
Thus the members of the farm bloc
in Congress will have as result OF
this conference declarations from the
farmers, Indicating much more ad-
vanccd demands on the part of the
farmers than were being made by the
leaders Of the Farm Bureau Federation
in Washington, with whom they were
cooperating.
AS it looks now, the Administration
has brought the farmers together to
give their orders to the bloc, instead of
to agree upon a moderate compromise
program which the Republican Party
could adopt. The division between the
East and West is heightened as re-
suit of the conference, which, as it
looks. will make a sharp attack upon
the railroads and indorse Muscle Shoals,
in addition TO asking for things the
Administration was ready to support.
Differ on Guarantee
The division in the conference itself
between radicals and conservatives will
be upon the question of Government
guarantee OF prices. The farmers
union al a meeting this morning decided
to press for a guarantee of prices of
wheat, corn and cotton. II is felt that
wheat will carry with it the prices Of
foodstuffs raised in the ground, that
corn will fix the price of hogs and cat
tie and that cotton and corn will fix the
price of wool.
The farmers union fight will be made
in the Committee on Prices, where
Julius II. Barnes, Mr.. HoOver's CO.
aide in the Grain Corporation, a grain
speCuator, will lead the fight against
Government. made prices. Mr.. Barnes
knows from experience and IS full of
facts and statistics. He is a formidable
foe of the radical price fixing farmers.
His presence and the presence Of
men like him are resented by the radical
minority in the conference. When the
gathering here is over this fight for sup
port Of the farmers will begin between
the farmers union and the other radical
organizations against the Farm Bureau
Federation, which is the strongest of
the farm bodies which control more
than half the delegates TO this con-
ventton.
The radicals will 60 to the farmers
with the price fixing program and at
tack this conference as hand picked and
instance the presence here of julius II.
Barnes. President Markham, of the H.
linois Central, and many others as ex-
amples of the non agricultural capt.
talistic element which prevented the
convention from adopting price fixing
program.
Intense jealousy exists betwecn the
farmers union GnL other bodies of its
type and the Falm Bureau Federation.
Nine tenths Of the insurgency here is
farm organization politics. The farm
bureau has been faVorHbly placed, en-
ioying q semi official status and having
the farm bloc as its agency in Con-
Grcss. 1t has grown rapidly and threat
cned to swallow the other farm organi-
cations. Being semi official, it is In
the nature of the case forced to be con-
Servative as farmers go.
BY raising the issue of price fixing,
the other organizations can go to the
farmers and check or perhaps break
the farm bureau. The real political
significance Of this movement can only
be told when the Congress campaign is
under way next fall and the position
Of the farmers Is made known by their
votes. In most agricultural districts
one candidate or another will be a
nripn .HNinp candidate