Askov American. [volume] (Askov, Pine County, Minn.) 1914-current, 1937-09-16
State Capitol News
BY A. I. HARRIS

An immediate, enthusiastic re-
Spouse to the farm conference called
by Governor Benson has been re-
ported throughout the state. Farm
ers who have received very small
part of the million dollars day"
which Twin Cities papers asserted
was lining their pockets have well
coined the plan to seriously consider
farm problems and prepare the
ground for needed legislation at the
next session of Congress.
Commissioner of Agriculture Om-
modt, after talking with farmers and
leaders of farm organizations, stated
that the real, dirt farmers who know
what they are up against are going
to write their own demands. No pro-
gram will be laid out beforehand, al
though discussion will follow the
points outlined by Governor Benson
calling for protection against falling
prices, improvement of tenancy con-
ditionS, and maintaining economic
gains made through good harvests.
The Governor, in his Labor day adj
dress at the State Fair, pointed out
that there can be no real prosperity
for the farmers unless the city worker,
who is the farmers principal Gus
toner, receives sufficient in wages
to buy the products of the farm.
Stressing the need for real solu-
ton for farmers problems, Governor
Benson asserted, when they tell you
that in 1887 Minnesota's farmers will
probably receive gross income of
million dollars a day, they do not
also tell you that over $500, 100000
in debts are piled up against those
farmers and that 50 per cent of our
farms are mortgaged"
These farmers are still in need of
a lift, the Governor continued, and
steady market is a vital factor in
affording them some measure of Sc
curity.
Governor Benson's position that the
farmers problems are far from solved
by increased income during 1887 are
fully borne out by a study prepared
by Labor Research Association.
It states that the increase in farm
income of about 70 per cent since the
low point of the crisis still leaves
farmers gross income more than 20
per cent below the average yearly
totals for the period from 1923 to
1929.
The Farm Journal this month
theories that national health and
prosperity is not secured by setting
up labor and price monopolieS, but
rigidly suppressing all monopolies,
maintaining free competition, and let
ting all businesses regulate each
other"
Analysed, what does this mean?
The Farm Journal might be
asked, who will do the rigid sup
pressing of business monopolies? OBJ
viously not Big Business itself. And
obviously not the small business man,
because not being one of the ''big
boys" who control the field, he cannot
suppress what he does not control.
There is left the government. But
if our government passed laws WHIP
ing out the sugar trust, the steel trust,
and all the other trusts, we are sure
the Farm Journal would say that
government should not interfere with
private business but should let "all
businesses regulate each other"
So there we are: "The Farm Jour-
nails" proposal simply brings us
around a circle and back into the
middle of a doughnut hole.
Could it be that the pious talk in
the Farm Journal" is only to give
labor organization black eye by
linking it with the business mon
opolies which for years have robbed
the farmer? The farmer should be
aware of the fact that at this moment
only one force threatens the strangle-
hold of business monopoly on the
lives of our people, and that is the
economic and political organization
of wage earners.
The grasshopper infestation which
has menaced crops in a wide belt of
southern counties for the past six
weeks now seems to be in control,
state entomologists reported last
week.
Counties centered in the area about
Rochester and Winona are now nearly
free of the pests, the county agents
say. In the Twin City sector the
same story is true. Credit for the
thoroughness of the cleanup work
must be shared by state entomologists,
working in connection with the state