The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1937-07-01
Successful Farm Bureau
Meeting June u
CONTINUED From Page One>

0lSCuSSGO dIlu PASS "SeS o.
to show that there was need t
carry out a strong legislative pro
gram in order to give agricultnr
somewhere near the same advan
tage that other groups enjoy. HI
cited a labor bill in the Illinois leg
islature which as introduced wouit
have prevented q farmer IRON
painting his own yard gate with
out a license. Mr.. Metzger alsf
touched on the commercial activit
les of the Illinois Agricultural AS
sociation and made a comparison
with their activities and those II
Minnesota. He said a guiding FAC
tor. that determines whether OF
not his organization would enter 9
particular commercial field woulo
be: THAT quality products were
not being made available to farm.
ers. athat service was not what
1t ought to be; 3-that margins
should be cut down. If all three OF
these could not be improved upon
by entering a given field the par
ticular project was dropped.
Mr.. Metzger then took up the
tariff question and stated in no
uncertain terms that no tariff will
work effectively without produc'
ton control. He showed that the
tariff of Csc a bushel on corn ano
42c a bushel on wheat If effective
only when we produce wheat and
corn in smaller quantities than
this country needs. In other words
it works only when it is necessary
to import a small amount. If these
products are produced in quantl'
ties so that some is for export then
the world price becomes the Amer
lean price. Mr.. Metzger quoted the
Prairie Farmer, the OUTSTANDING
Illinois farm paper, as stating that
in 1884 one pair of pants were
produced for each three men IN
this country. He showed that the
makers and merchandisers OF
these pants had tariff protection
but in order to make tariff pro-
lection effective they reduced pro-
duction to a point so only one was
produced for each three men. He
made it very clear that in the case
of wheat for years and years the
export market at Liverpool deter
mined the American price and
asked farmers if they couldn't re-
member in selling wheat in years
gone by when the wheat buyer
would tell them Our price today
is SOC and in Liverpool it is 66c. y
T., again used this Illustration 10
show that tariff is ineffective with
out controlled production. In his
talk he also brought out that the
wears from 1900 to 1880 were fav-
orable for the man who produced
dairy products, poultry and 1rult.
This was due to the fact that for
most of this time tariff was eff
fective on these three items be-
cause they were produced in small
err amounts than this country need
ed. In the same period of time he
showed that in countries that ma
jored in grain and livestock pro-
duction the number of rented
farms increased compared to the
example Just quoted above where
in those sections the number Oh
rented farms decreased. Announcer
misconception concerning the TAR
iff was also brought out and that
is if a tariff is effective the Amer
lean people pay the extra price.
The example of cotton cloth was
cited where the increase OF tarl1l
was enough to raise the price OF
the cloth Il c yard but the actual
price increase was 11ac a yard. In
other words there are dltferent
places along the line where the IN
crease in price was added with the
tariff being offered as the excuse.
He urged that farmers be interest
ed in the tariffs on the articles
that they buy on the farm as well
as for articles that they sell. Far.
mers of course are great buyers OF
clothing, machinery, automobiles
tractors, etc., and for that reason
should be considerably interested
in the tariff rates on these items.
He criticized the stand OF some
folks who state that the AAA was
responsible for the loss Of the ex-
port market. He gave statistics 70
show that $3.50 of the export mar
ket was lost before the AAA ever
came into the picture. In his mind
the Smoot-Hawley tariff did more
to destroy the foreign agricultural
market than anything else. Mr..
Metzger stated that even he be-
comes alarmed about imports at
times but the consoling thing
about imports is that we have no
imports when the American price
is low and when we have imports
into this country then we can rest
assured that the tariff is really eff
fective. He showed that in 1882
with CSC wheat, Ice butter and &c
hogs not a soul in the country had
any comments to make about i'm
ports coming into this country.
There were of course no imports
at those prices. When the price be-
came higher of course some i'm
ports came in and these imports
had to come in over the tariff rate
for those countries. It really Illus
trates beyond a doubt that tariffs
are effective only when we pro-
duce in this country an amount Of
a given commodity smaller than
we consume. Mr.. Metzger predicts
that If we had a normal corn crop
this year that we would see price
Of CSC or 4Oc on corn this fall and
offered corn loans on storage
plan as a means to remedy this
particular situation. He discussed
the new Farm Bureau farm bill in
Congress and showed that some
production adjustment would be
necessary to make that new bill
effective. In the case Of wheat 1t
provides that when the production
in any one year reaches 1900