Evening star., 1937-05-30

Cornell he conducted research work,
( IN connection with his teaching, in
! cooperative marketing and farm
/ finance, and in 1925 he was awarded
q fellowship by the International
/ Education Board and as result spent
! almost year studying cooperative
| marketing and finance in the British
Isles, Denmark, Norway, Sweden,
Holland and Germany In 1881 the
| Federal Farm Board made use Of his
services by sending him to make
special study of farmers co-operatives
in Puerto Rico.
At one stage of his career, this
young Myers had been asked to advise
New York's Agricultural Commission,
at time when Henry Morgenthau
was its chairman. Soon after the
! election Of President Roosevelt, in
November, 1882, Morgenthau visited
/ Cornell and called into conference
/ several OF the agricultural staff to
| secure their recommendations on
legislation designed to halt agricul-
! lures swift decline to bankruptcy.
Morgenthau remembered the work
| Myers had done for his New York
! commission, and asked him for a
| constructive opinion.
Myers told him: Il believe all the
varied and scattered governmental
agencies for agricultural credit should
be brought in one cooperative organi-
I zation. Credit for the farmer should
all go out one door" Morgenthau
asked Myers to work on that" For
/ months thereafter the Cornell pro-
fessor labored in Washington, con-
sulting with leaders of farm organi-
cations. sitting in committees of Con-
gress, helping draft suggestions for
! legislation.
TWO months after President Roose-
velt signed his executive order
creating the Farm Credit Administra-
ton, Congress confirmed the action
with necessary legislation. Two Of
/ the most important features of the
program of the new organization rep
resented the constructive suggestions
| of Myers. The first of these was an
emergency program for meeting the
wave of farm foreclosures and the
second was the coordination of all
| farm credit units under one institu-
tlon In November of the same year,
the President appointed Myers to
succeed Henry Morgenthau as governor
Of the organization he had helped to
| build
At the time Gov Myers took the
job. applications for farm mortgage
reflnancing were pouring in from the
IL Federal Land Banks at the rate
Of 10000 week. and at one peak
sl50,000,000 was disbursed in a single
month. New credit systems had to
be built hastily to round out opera
tions. 1t was not long before there
was not single agricultural county
in the United States wherein any
| competent farmer could not have
access to every form of cooperative
credit necessary to continue his busi-
ness.
Commenting now upon the improved
condition of agriculture and increased
prosperity of the farmer, Gov Myers
says: Everything has helped farmers
to buy Incomes have gone up In
terest has gone down. And taxes
have been reduced somewhat. The
value of farms, which always follow
the up or down swing of general agri-
cultural conditions, though the curve
is less violent, has steadily increased.
That value was at peak in 1920,
and continuously declined until 1888
when only IS per cent of the 19l2-1914
| average was achieved. Since then
values have risen, until today they
have reached IS per cent of that pre-
war average"
7 NDER the cooperative system set
up by the Farm Credit Admins
tration, the land banks make con-
servative flrst-mortgage loans to
farmers-that is, up to so per cent
value of their farms. Based on this,
they were enabled to sell bonds to
investors and get fair rate of in
terest But loans beyond so per cent
of valuation involve more risk for the
investor, and to meet this situation,
the Federal Farm Mortgage Corp.
was set up. This corporation was
empowered to make second mortgage
| loans that with the first mortgage
loans could go up as high as IS per
cent of the value of the farm, and it
is this type of loan that is being used
| to great extent to establish the
young men eager for farm life on
farms of their own. The cost to the
Government, thus far, has amounted
to $4,000, 100000, but all costs in con-
nectioh with making loans and pay
ments and other similar operating
costs have been paid by the farmer,
so it can be seen that the ultimate
cost to the Government, if the Farm
Credit Administration is successful
in collecting all of the loans, will be
very small, indeed.
Among the emergency jobs of the
administration has been the necessity
for carrying along farmers of the
drought area who have met with mis-
fortune. This year loans amounting
to about $30,000,000 have been made
to 250,000 farmers, largely in this
area, to enable them to put In crop
or otherwise to help them get re-
established. But emergency work
and needs are passing. and the adj
ministration is concentrating its at
tention and activities more and more
upon the permanent credit agencies
that will, in due time, become the
property of the farmers themselves
under the system.
There are, for example, the "Pro-
duction Credit Associations" These
form a system of credit for financing
farm operations rather than homes.
BY means Of loans made, the farmer
can buy fertilizer feed or other things
necessary for the conduct of his busi.
ness. In 1888, when banks were no
longer making loans to farmers and