Evening star., 1937-02-28

- AOSc AAA4ACA VA ~
4 \ angeburg, 8. c., won't
stand for the Government telling them
when to 60 to bed and when to get
up"
But II the tenancy program bears
any resemblance to the Resettlement
Administrations rural rehabilitation
program the Government will tell the
tenant farmer how often they may go
to the movies, advise them on the sum
to spend for tea, coffee and cocoa and
notify them when to submit to a
physical examination.
The rurally rehabilitated number
600, 900, and for each of them Re-
settlement, the agency which sup
posedly will manage the tenancy
elimination campaign, helps the
farmer to help himself" through a
management plan. The management
plan, which has the pragmatic pur-
pose of protecting the loan and the
humane aim Of saving the farmer
from the ravages Of poverty, enables
the Federal Government to collect q
mass Of intimate chit-chat about the
lives of those who have rehabilitation
loans, and Secretary Wallace has dis
closed that he feels all beneficiaries Of
the tenancy plan in its early stages
should receive such loans. Down to
the last jot OF their existences. the
SOC, 900 are guided and guarded by
their creditor, the Government. Each
year they must fill out form RA-RR 36
supplement to RA-RR 14) which be-
gins with a recitation of the guam
tity of whole milk used during the
year and ends with a note on the
amount spent for transportation to
and from school. an item following
only a few dotted lines after a space
for the debtor to record the sum de-
voted during the twelvemonth to the
BARRIERS.
2,865,155 Tenant Farmers.
There are 2,S65,155 tenant farmers
in the United States. Another group
of 100000 farmers living in the IL
States of the Great Plains region like
wise seems to offer fair game to the
philosophical school which advocates
paternalism in government. For a
panel OF presidential experts has found
that this territory is SO useless for
cultivation that the Government must
plan the economy Of the whole ter
ritory, including the personal economy
of the rural inhabitants of the terri
tory. "The plainsman cannot assume
that whatever is for his immediate
good is also good for everybody" the
Great Plains Committee reported to
the White House. "Only of his long
run good is this true, and in the short
run there must often be sacrifices;
he cannot assume the right always
to do with his own property as he
likes-he may ruin another mans
property If he does"
So Washington would like to man
age the lives of about 3,500,000 farm
ers, or $4,000, 900 persons. The ten
ants allegiance to the Federal Gov
ernment would continue for 20 to 40
years, and how long it would take to
remake the Great Plains unstated.
Whether such paternalistic control Is
good or evil Is debatable, but its con-
sequences are interesting. Tenancy is
thickest in the cotton South and the
cornfields of the Midwest. The result
Of the tenancy and Great Plains pro-
grams being carried to the ultimate
would be that the rural populace of
a large L-shaped slice of the United
States, from the sea to Texas and
Texas to Canada, would practice
farming and conduct themselves ac-
cording to farm management pro-
grams designed in Washington and
supported by this argument:
"Often the difficulties of these
farmers are due to lack Of skill in
managing their farms. To make sure
that the land Is put to its best use,
experts help the farmers who are seek
ing loans to make plans for running