The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1925-12-09
Coolidge Proposes
Fake Cures for U. S.
Agricultural Problems
CONTINUED from page -

there is the general banking system,
national and state. All of these
agencies need to give more informed
attention to farm needs. They need
more energy in administration. They
should be equipped to supply not only
credit but sound business advice, and
the farmers to a much greater extent
should learn to use all these facil-
tiles"
Means Slavery.
Tho yelled in the garb of bene-
fcence and consideration for the
farmers, the farm loan and inter
mediate credit banks, the country
banks Irrational and state) and the
whole banking combine are in one
gigantic movement to reduce the
farmers of the middle west to the
condition of land slaves, taking or
ders from the agents of the big bank
ers, packers, millers, and other trusts
exploiting them.
The sentence in Coolidge's speech
saying "They (the banks) should be
equipped to supply not only credit
but sound business advice" portends
what is in store for the impoverished
farmers who, in ever larger numbers,
are forced to appeal to the loan
sharks for aid to enable them to hold
crops for better prices-prices that
many times do not materialize. Final
| ly, in desperation, the farmers are
forced to dispose of their crop below
the anticipated price. Then the loan
becomes a permanent mortgage plas-
tered on the land.
Advice from country bankers, work
ing as agents of the big combines is
simply form of swindling the farmer.
They advise him not to sell his crop,
but hold it for better prices, while
they "carry him over" with a loan,
Once in the clutches of the money
octopus the farmers then pay dearly
for the first advice" so graciously ex-
tended by the banker From that
time onward they are forced to take
orders from the bankers.
The methodical, systematic eXploita-
ton of the farmer is proceeding thru
this banking system that Coolidge pro-
poses to extend. 1t is only question
of time when each farmer graciously
permitted by the great combines to
nhabit the land he once owned will
receive instructions regarding the
sort of crop he shall plant. If Armour
& Co. want more beef, the farmer
must raise crops that feed cattle, and
turn much of his land into pasture,
| 'egardless of his desires. If the mill
ers control the bank and insist upon
wheat the farmer will be forced to
dispose of his live stock and devote
most of his soil to grain growing.
Agent of the Banks.
President Coolidge is the agent of
the bank combine. The main wing of
the party of which he is the head
represents finance capital while its
left wing in the middle west repre-
setns the harvester trust, the packing
house trust, the milling trust and the
rail combines, all of which bleed the
farmers to the limit The more than
one billion dollars put out lat moder-
ate rates" to $4,000 farmers means
that most of that number is now hope
lessly entangled in the tentacles of
the bank octopus, from which they
will never extricate themselves un-
der the capitalist system.
Another fraudulent statement of
Coolidge was to the effect that thru
cooperative marketing much could be
gained by the farmers. The sort of
cooperative marketing now in vogue,
under the control of agents of the
railroads, benefits only the elevator
terminals and the railroads by max
ing much easier for them to handle
the volume of grain products than
when marketing is carried on indi-
vidually. Under a system devised to
aid the farmer such marketing is adj
vantageous, but under the system of
gouging the farmer for all he will
bear such cooperation only benefits
the railroads and in no way aids the
farmer.
Banal Patriotic Plea.
Tho addressing exploiters of the
farmers Coolidge spoke primarily for
the purpose of befuddling the real
farmers who were not at the Sherman
hotel and who had no voice in choos
ing those who were there. He in
dulged in a stupid, banal laudation OF
the farmer in history. Calling them
the builders Of the nation he traced
their history from the founding OF
America, thru the revolution, the civil
war and the world war, and claimed
they had won all the victories. OF
course, in this eulogy he includes him
self, as he tried to stead the thunder
of roaring Magnus Johnson, the origin
al Minnesota dirt" farmer statesman
by proclaiming himself a Vermont
dirt" farmer.
Visit Purely Political.
The republican party is in dire