The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-09-09
GERMAN FARME ERS PROMISED ACTUAL
 VALUE FUR CROPS
Critical Situation Demands Immediate Action To Pre-
 vent Winter Starvation
By FERDINAND JAIN Geased Wire to The ARe-Hernld)

Oeased Wire to The ARe-Hernld)
 BERLIN. Sept. S.-The threat of the hig-scale farmers of Prussia to starve Berlin rather than sell their crops for worthless currency, has been averted by equalization Cf the Stresemann government to the hoard CTS of great food stores
 N Instead of paper money. the junk CTS, according to the new arrange 'bonds," which are guaranteed by the Reich to have the full value and sta bility of goods, dollars or pounds sterling.
 Stresemann and his cabinet realized at last that the big farmers were actually retaining virtually all of their bumper crops just harvested, and that visibly little of it was being thrown on the market.
 The gold loan bonds" arrange ment is to hold good for all grain de- livered during September, and will, provided the junkers are convinced that they have in these bonds some food, save the capital from a winter of hunger. The farmers have not as yet expressed wide approval of the bonds, but Stresemann Is confident that the new issue will uncover the grain hordes.
 In addition. the junkers have been granted liberal concessions in the payment of the new and somewhat oppressive land taxes.
 This ever-present spectre of hum ger. together with the German her TOT of the. continually aggravated muddle in the Ruhr, is sending the government on the gallop toward some sort of truce with France. Ger many is dazed and appalled, by the adamant stand of the French military regime.
 German Is Sentenced.
 Saturday, for example, there came from Dusseldorf news that a Ger man has been sentenced to death for the bomb explosion of August 4, which injured two Frenchmen and five Germans, including one eight year-old girl.
 At the same time. the kitchens of the old imperial palace here were thrown open for relief purposes, un- der the administration of Austrian relief corps workers.
 Simultaneously. an important real estate transaction, involving the pur- chase by bank Gf an unused side street formerly used as a private royal driveway. was halted when the authorities refused to accept their own paper marks, demanding stable currency.
 All these burdens are painful to the back of camel already griev- ously fractured. It is not surprising that Berlin greeted with joy the an- nouncement Saturday that the gov- ernment hopes to begin within a fortnight it's negotiations with France for the best possible terms n nf q n c1a a m of m separations.
 Passive resistance" is so wan and feeble that the indus .rialists, proud fathers of the civilian warfare i'd ga year ago, are now most ardently for its discontinuance. They share the governments view that the Ruhr conflict must be stopped at once, that its positive cost and the losses from productivity are the prin- cipal leeches upon the federal treas ury, and the greatest barriers to steadying the mark.
 From the oratorical Cuno position of defiance, Germany has changed overnight to an eagerness for peace at almost any price. True, Poin- cares slogan of Unconditional sur renders of passive resistance" is an moving, and Stresemann would like to have 1t modified; but above all lie wants assurances that the Ruhr
 
 will not be deftly cut off from the fatherland. Fears of the formation of Amgerman republic are actively behind the conciliatory attitude. Editorial Advice.
 George Bernhard, editor of the vosslsche Zeitung, whose views command profound attention in Der lin, urged the government in an edi- torial Saturday that Germanys chief danger lies in it's foreign policy, and that "as long as Germany Is com pelled to pour immense sums into the Ruhr battle, no measures, even confiscation of half all the private property in the republic, will bring Germany back on her feet" He ad- vocated negotiations with France. supported by simultaneous conversa- tions with England and Belgium.
 In furtherance of the confiscation measures directed against all for eign currencies. dictatorial powers have been given the Prussian min ister, Fellinger. to disregard consti- tutional safeguards in his search Tor solid valuta.
 Fellinger's men are authorized to enter and search private dwellings,, open letters and telegrams. eaves- drop on telephone conversations, and invade the most private sanctuaries of both Germans and foreigners.
 Not only currency. but watches, rings, silver. platinum and gold are liable to seizure if the government decides it needs them in bolstering the mark. All this Is especially hard on foreigners, whose only way of maintaining a sinking fund" of cash has been to stow 1t away in dollars or pounds.
 Women were prominent in Satur- days melees in the queues before the margarine shops. They were s, bdued by the green" police. The Austrian government, which has been working in ever closer ac- cord with Berlin, is now printing five and ten million mark notes for