Evening star., 1936-10-11
By the Associated Press.

By the Associated Press.
OMAfIA, -Nebr., October 10.-Fol
lowing Is the complete text of Presi
dent Roosevelt's address here tonight
First word to you as Nebras-
kans.. I hope 1t will be heard by
the citizens of the other Al States,
because I know that what am go
ing. to say represents the convic-
ton of the great majority Of those
who are devoted to good govern
nent, clean government, repre-
sentative government.
On this. platform sits a man
whose reputation for many years
has been known in every COM
munity-a man old in years but
young In heart-a man who
through all these years has had no
boss but his own conscience-the
senior Senator from the State OF
Nebraska. given to the Nation by
the people of Nebraska-George
". Norris.
Outside of my own State of New
York;I have consistently refrained
from taking part in elections In
cay other State.
But Senator Norris name has
been entered as a candidate for
Senator from Nebraska. And to
my rule Of non-participation in
State elections I have made-and
so-+ieng as he lives I always will
inake-one >rnagnificently justified
exception.
, George Norris candidacy tram
scends State and party lines. In
out national history we have had
few elder statesmen who. like him,
have preserved the aspirations of
youth as they accumulated the
wisdom Of years. He is one of the
major prophets of America.
Help this great American to con-
tinue an historic career of service.
Nebraska will be doing a great
service, not only to itself but to
every other State in the Union
and to the Nation as whole If 1t
places this great American above
partisanship and keeps George
Norris in the Senate of the United
States.
In 1882 I pledged my admins
trasion to a farm policy that would
help the farmer. Tonight every
man and woman on an, American
farm who has read today's market
reports knows that We have done
what we said we would do. What
needed to be done?
I YOU know that in March, 1888,
afte, IL lean years. farm income
was disappearing and farm prices
had sunk to bankruptcy level
Serious Condition
OF Farms Overcome.
In 1882 Americas farm popula-
tion was the greatest in our his
tory, but the farmers income was
the lowest for the quarter century
for which we have records. Farm
ers represented 25 per cent OF the
Nations population-but they got
only ia per cent of the national
income.
The specter Of foreclosure stalked
the farmers plow.
American agriculture was on the
road to pauperisnl.
When the World War ended
the nations of Europe whom we
had been feeding went back to
farming for themselves. Our farm
ers we're left holding the bag-a
bag that bulged with vast quanti-
ties of wheat, corn and cotton, for
which the market had disappeared.
That was the farmers plight.
What did Republican leadership 90
about it?
The best that it could offer was
the Farm Board. The Farm Board
set an all-high for extravagant
futility. It met the problem OF un-
salable and unexportable sur
pluses by piling up bigger surpluses'
To finish the job, the Repuo-
lican Smoot-Hawley tariff robbed
the farmer of his last chance for a
foreign market.
We found that this conspicuous
failure of government to help the
farmer had created-by March.
1e33-a state of mind in the Ma
ton which, ITSELF seemed to bar
any way out Of the farmers diff
culties. There was a defeatist at
titude "a conviction that the
farmer could not be helped-that
all efforts were foredoomed to fail
ure-that any party which dared
to substitute action for talk would
get its political fingers burned.
Along with this defeatism there
was the belief that money spent on
the farm problem was money vast
ed-that the only excuse for spend
ing it was to keep the farmer in
line-to buy political peace.
That was what had happened to
American agriculture when this
administration came into Office.
That was the debris of Il years
of failure which We had to clear
savav hefore We could begin to Law