Evening star., 1926-12-07
BACKGROUND OF EVENTS
BY PAUL Y. COLLINS.

in manufactures. If conditions were
such as to restrict industrial workers
to an earning capacity of less than
$500 a year, and reduced the trade
of the farmers Sc 6,00O, 100000 by only
S1OO per farm, it would bring nation
wide strikes for better industrial
wages and bring bankruptcy to the
manufacturing industry such as this
country has never known. according
to the economists Of the Department
of Agriculture.
X n X X
In concrete proof that the farm dis
tress is not limited to the Midwest,
the census figures are taken showing
the decrease. 1920-25, in farm popula-
ton all over the United States. Iowa
is the most vociferous In protesting
the conditions. but that State has lost
net only 27,000 farmers in the last five
years-3.4 per cent. Massachusetts,
has lost 18 per cent; Rhode Island.
% per cent; Maryland. 1917 per cent;
Delaware. 4.S per cent: Missouri. 81
per cent; South Carolina, 15.1 per
cent; Montana, 10 per cent; Illinois.
9.3 per cent. All these are net losses
of farm population.
The banks of Iowa today are trying
to avoid receiverships by a general
appeal of the business men of their
respective cities where the banks have
taken farm loans, with mortgages as
security. The method adopted in sew
eral cases is to persuade all depositors
to waive control over their checking
accounts, with the payment of 65 per
cent cash and the other 35 per cent
to be paid in installments covering
the next four years. Another group of
banks proposes to pay their depositors
10 per cent of their accounts March
Is, 1927; 10 per cent October Is, Is
per cent March 15, 1928, and so ex-
tend payments up to October Is, 1880.
In Spokane, Wash, according to
the statement of the Federal Land
Bank, the banks have charged off
their books farm real estate amount
ing to $3,175 ,494 taken on loans to-
taling 500, ,493 ,O00-a loss on securi-
ties amounting to over per cent.
From Parish, in central New York,
comes a statement that half the farms
of that county are now abandoned,
and of the others a quarter of the
farmers are living on earnings in in
dustry, which keep the farm from
abandonment as home, while others
are living up the Enthusiastically ex-
hausting the equity by living ex-
penses
The universal panacea for farm de-
preston is "diversification of crops"
but it is pointed out that the main
form of "diversification' in most Sec
tions has been merely the substitution
of one crop for another. For exs
ample, when cattle raising in Texas
became improbable, the "cow men's
abandoned cattle and turned to cot.
ton. When wheat was a losing crop
in Minnesota. the farmers turned to
corn. This simply shifted burdens
FvOv o. %
that is not diversification.
Farmers attack all projects of rec
| lamation of swamp or irrigation or
clearing of other waste land. They
| complain that we cannot even now
| farm all our acres profitably, so why
add to competition? They are led to
hope that the loss of farm population
through the superior attractions Of
industrial wages will ultimately sta
biliZe conditions. and, by increasing
the consumers and reducing the pro-
| ducers, may eventually equalize sup
| ply and demand.
| But they are dismayed upon read
| ing in the Department Of Agriculture
| Yearbook that reclamation projects
cover 100000 900 acres which would
thus be added to available farm land.
| Wnon II Is TeuleU1DoTeu CIldC I'LL
France has only 123,000,0 900 acres OF
farm land, Germany only 10000. 900
acres, Canada (under cultivation 109,-
OOO, 900 and the United States, up to
the present, only 391 900 900 acres, the
| worried farmer views with alarm" a
policy that would add to the compe-
| tition here of nearly a third Of our
present acreage. or create a new
France. We had been told that our
last acre OF wild land had been taken
up and that, from now on into an
indefinite future, as our population
inevitably increased. the demand for
food would force enhanced values of
| farms.
There are several projects before
! Congress, each claimed by its au.
| thor to contain the best solution Of
the problem, but no one who Is in
formed discounts the seriousness of
the situation. ..
Copyright. 1870. by Psul v. coli,sl