The Farmington times. (Farmington, St. Francois County, Mo.) 1905-1926, 1922-01-27

AGRICULTURAL DEPRESSION

AGRICULTURAL DEPRESSION
In the annual report of the State
Board Of Agriculture for the year
1921, just issued, in the discussion of
the depressed condition of agriculture
for the past year, the following SEN
tence appears: mo political party
could have prevented this agricultural
depression" That declaration is of
course merely the opinion of the au-
thor Of the report, and is not backed
up by any reasoning except such as
the unthinking man on the street US
ually INDUCES in, namely: That if the
farmer would let automobiles and oil
stocks alone he would be better off.
All / care to say in reply to this is
that the same reasoning will apply
with equal or greater force to the
banker, the merchant and the manu-
facturer; even to the man on the
street himself. All men, when they
are prospecting, are more easily in
weighed into speculation and extrava-
gance, than during hard times. But
this does not account for the price of
hogs falling from twenty cents a
pound to seven cents; for cattle fall
ing from eighteen cents to six cents;
for wheat falling from three dollars a
bushel to one dollar; for corn falling
from two dollars bushel to twenty
five cents; for oats falling from 70
cents to 25 cents; nor for cotton fall
ing from! 80 cents to 10 cents pound.
It must be borne in mind that these
appalling depreciations in values came
about in face of the fact that for the
past three years more than one hun
dred and fifty million Of civilized peo-
pie in Central Europe have been in
dire distress for want of bread and
meat and clothing and that millions of
them have actually starved and frozen
to death for want Of the. very things
we have produced in such super
abundance, that 1t was hardly market
able. Those people, the Germans,
Austrians, Poles, Zechs, Serbians,
Roumanians and Armenians, if credit
had been extended to them would have
taken and consumed all the surplus we
had to spare. They were short of
food, clothing, work stock, milk stock,
farm implements and everything that
they needed for subsistence, and if
they had been supplied from our
stocks there would have been but lit
tie or no decline In prices of agricul-
tural products in this country.
1t may be true, as the report above
referred to says, that "No political
party could have prevented this agri-
cultural depression" but it seems to
me to be about as clear as mathe-
NAUTICAL demonstration that our gov
eminent could have prevented it by
carrying out the policy of President
Wilson. On the day the armistice
was signed, November II, 1918, in lay
ing before congress the terms of the
armistice, he said:
"The humane temper and intention
Of the victorious governments have
already been manifested in very
practical way. Their representatives
in the supreme war council at Ver-
sailles have by unanimous resolution
assured the peoples of the Central EN-
pires that everything that is possible
in the circumstances will be done to
supply them with food and relieve the
distressing want that is in so many
places threatening their very lives;
and steps are to be taken Immediately
to organize these efforts at relief in
the same systematic manner that they
were organized in the case of Belgi-
UNI. By the use of the idle tonnage
of the Central Empires it ought
presently to be possible to lift the
fear of utter misery from their OPP
pressed population and set their
minds and energies free FOR the great
and hazardous tasks of political recon-
struction which now face them on ev-
cry hand. Hunger does not breed re-
form; it breeds madness and all the
ugly distempers that makes an or
dered life impossible"
This sane and humane policy was
never carried out. Why? Because
England, France and Italy, exhausted
as they were by war, were not able to
carry it out alone and the United
States had just elected a Republican
Congress. The Republican party re-
fused to follow the lead Of President
Wilson and began a campaign of two
years duration that had for its slogan,
destroy Wilson and all his works"
The Congress that was then in session
was almost equally divided politically,
and the Democratic party wa not
unit in the support of the, president,
many Of its members Joined in the I'M
thinking cutlery against mixing In the
affairs Of Europe. The result was
that his hands were tied, and our gov
ernmentIwas prevented from aiding in
the rehabilitation, either politically or
economically.
For a time we prospered in spite of |
the world confusion that resulted from
this state of affairs. What was left i
Of the free gold supply Of the world
flowed to the United States during the
year 1919. When that was exhausted,
sarly in 1920, foreign trade began to