Brownsville herald. [volume] (Brownsville, Tex.) 1910-current, 1929-03-23

> Farm
By ARTHUR Fl. JENKINS
Edifar The Farm Journal
Stanley

.here are mllllOn5 o. pcOpley l
bpose, who will never be able to
through their heads what farm
is. They think they know. They
-rlld be annoyed to be told that
~ do not know. But one simple
sic fact Of agriculture, the ele-
sntary thing about it, escapes
tm and always will. no doubt.
What is, briefly, that agriculture
4not one, but a group Of competing
! ~lsinesseS.
Farming is not simjle, but ex-
complex.
Warmers are not alike, but differ
1nong themselves as much as city
do, or more
I Farmers not only do not, but IN
he nature Of things cannot, unlver-
billy agree on anything-unless it be
hat taxes are too high.
| One branch of the farming bust
hess is often in opposition TO an
bther branch. and in bitter compe-
Eition with it. while both branches
be in conflict with the inter-
ests of industry and commerce.
Under such circumstances, how
ridiculous it is to speak Of the farm
as if they constituted a single
united and homogeneous class OF
people.
How absurd the cry Of some poll
ticians. inside and outside congress
that II farmers. themselves. woulc
agree on some measure OF farm leg
islation. congress would put i
through for them.
Such a thing is impossible. since
many branches Of farming are CON
srlrners of the products Of othel
branches. and what would help ont
would often hurt the other.
That is not to say that agrlcul
ture is in a chronic state Of interna
war. The interests Of buyer ant
seller are antagonistic. to be sure
but both parties n united in want
ing the sale to go through. TIL
trade must take place, or both par
ties are worse off.
But these are commonplaces, an
I am wandering from my point.
= =
What I would like every reader c
these words to keep firmly in min
is that 'the farmers" Or farming
or "the business Of agriculture
come very close to meaning nothin
at all, unles you specify whic
branches of farming are meant.
One of the famous men in til
business is Thomas D. Campbell
Montana. who has received a gre;
deal of publicity for the methods I
which, OF $4,000 acres Of India
lands. he produces enormous crol
Of wheat. He uses tractors onl
There is no livestock on his farm
he uses no fertilizer to replace Il
plant food ne takes from the soil
What he does is to mine from Il
virgin soil the fertility stored thel
turning it into wheat by machil
methods. When that fertility is d
pleted. and yields become so Il
that the grain is no longer produc
at a profit. MI. Campbell will mo
elsewhere or 60 out of business.
There is hardly any resemblan
between such operations and the
of a genuine farm. I am not Su
that clam digging has not a bett
right to be called by the name
agriculture.
MI. Campbell, by the way, is NJ
in Russia, I believe, advising {
Soviet government how to apply t
machine methods to the gre
stretches of Russian wheat lands
But there is no greater differer
between Montana wheat mining a
real farming than there is, for {
: ample, between a dairy farmer
northern New York and a colt
grower in the Texas Panhandle.
between a raiser of market hogs
Illinois. a potato grower in Mai
and a poultryman in Sonoma col
: ty, Cal.
? There is. I think, no moral
l these observations. But when
; ariseth in the wilderness, claim
4 to be the true and authentic voice
:, the farmer. it is always permissi
to ask. in the interest Of clar
"the voice of WHICH farner?"