The producers news. [volume] (Plentywood, Mont.) 1918-1937, 1933-06-16
WHOSE CROP is 1T GOING TO BE?

When harvest comes there will come the annual swarm
of collectors for the bankers for the machine
companies Seed fertilizer and feed collectors There will be
collectors from the private capitalist corporations and from
the capitalist agencies of the government the Federal Land
Banks the Rural Credit organizations and the ReconStruc
tOn Finance Corporation
The grasshoppers and other natural bights rarely. if
ever hit the entire country few states here and few
there, few counties herea few there forty or eighty
here-a quarter or half section there.
The man-made blight that comes with harvest is not
patchy are the natural bgts The potato growers OF
of California the fruit farmers of Florida the tobacco
farmers of Kentucky the wheat farmers of the Northwest
the hog raisers of the Corn Be-from Atlantic to Pacific
from the Canadian line to the gulf the American farmers
will this of parasites, the collector gangs settle
down their crops.
Like the hoppers at their very worst this of col
Iecors will take whatever they get their fangs on Like
the hOpprs the collectors have some very effective weapons
The most effective of these is the law
They have '1egal right to crops, they tell us.
The debts legally contracted and must be pad-ths
is their cry.
itast class the rch rob of toll Their government
is built around this exploitation Hence whatever debts
used to rob of course legal under system Of
robbery such as we live in
For us, however, it is not a question of legality.
For us the question now is Glow are our families going
to live?"
The only will have to live through the
coming winter, with the exception of what relief will
have to force from the government to keep alive will be
the return from crop Whatever is taken from will
mean that much hunger and misery for ourselves and
families
They talk about the legality of these debts of their
liens, notes. and mortgages Since the Farmers National
Relief Conference last December the farmers thruout the
country have developed the slogan he wives and children
have the first mortgage"
This slogan that for us the lives of fam
lily and the families of neghbOrs of first i'm
pOrtauce-that any legality that threatens these
lives must be fought For us it is not question of
claw" Of 'legality" For us it is question of fe
The coector-tentaces of the Wall Street octopus must
be beaten back They care even less however for our
slogans than for our lives and the lives of our loved ones
There is thing that they do understand our
massed power Behind slogan must rally the million
armed power of the working people on the land.
In the words of the song Solidarity
In our hands is placed power
Greater than their boarded gOld
'FOr in UNION WE ARE STRONG"
In every farm community must rally the farmers for
struggle to keep the crop to drive off the coectorgan
to assure our families of living this coming winter.
Midst all the talk of relief under the Roosevelt adj
ministratiOn, one item has been Ommitted. We have
been fed plans and programs but have not been
assured decent living We have not been assured
an existence.
The actions of the Roosevelt administration fins
during nearly four months of operaon-have not
our situation bit We cannot expect this from an adj
mnstraon or party whose leading lights are on J. P
Under the best of possible conditions now the cron will
not De sufficient to give decent living We shall have
70 night Tor relief The first step to take to make sure
OF one thing-OUR CROP.
Mass action can keep this crop for U.S. Thepoer Of the
united in fighting front-can keep the coec
tors hands away from the lives of our children
From coast to cOast-ONE COLLECTOR DRIVE
10 free the countryside of this plague. The limited
Farmers League calls all farmers TO Join with II IN
this drive ''' = ~