The Bluffton news. [volume] (Bluffton, Ohio) 1875-current, 1941-11-20
DIR. O. E. Baker, L. ). Dept.
Of Agriculture, Addresses
Ministerial Group
Farm Tenancy Increasing In
Alarming Proportions in
Rural America

Necessity for holding fast to the
principles of private ownership of
farm property as the foundation of
freedom and democracy was voiced
by DR.. o. E. Baker, of the Department
of Agriculture in Washington, d. c.,
who addressed ministerial meetings
held in connection with the Bluffton
College Bible lectures on the campus,
Thursday.
DIR. Baker is the senior member of
the Bureau of Agricultural Economics
and Rural Welfare in the Department
of Agriculture. He has been especi-
| ally interested in the Amish and Men
MONTE farmers who have been provid-
ing their children with farms while
many of the highly commercialized
farmers of the corn belt have been
losing their lands to insurance COM
panies and banks.
Farm Ownership
Explanation of this can be found in
more closely knit family ties, greater
frugality and the discipline of hard
work. The tendency to pass on the
farming land to the children is good
because it provides counter tendency
to the trend of farm tenancy, DIR.
| Baker said.
Take Iowa, the richest soil state in
America, for example. Only half OF
the farmers in that state now own
their own farms and the mortgage
debt on the farms still owned by their
operators reduced the equity of these
owners to one-half. In other words,
the equity of farm operators in farm
real estate in Iowa, according to the
1885 agricultural census was only a
per cent. This means that 10000
former tenants were looking in vain
for farms in Iowa last year.
Rural Poletariat
The result of this tendency in rural
America is for vast rural proletarlat
to develop and the consequence that
as many property-less people in the
country as in the cities is rapidly de-
veloping. In the cities it is safe to
say that a majority of families have
nothing left except an automobile,
bought on credit, some old furniture
and the clothes they wear.
The public schools in the cities are
not responsible for this but the rural
children who associate with the urban
| children absorb their culture and start
the process of Conspicuous consump-
ton.
| Birth Rate Decline
A disturbing aspect of urban cul-
ture is the decline of the birth rate
with the result that in the cities 10
adults are raising seven children.
Should the proportion continue, these
seven would have only five children
and these five would have only three
and one half. In a century the pop
ulation would fall to about one third
the present figure, were there no
movement to the cities from the farms
and villages.
The urban deficit in children now
more than balances the rural surplus;
unless there is a relaxation of the re-
striction on immigration or unless the
births increase, both unlikely, the
population of the nation will reach
crest in a decade or two and then to
decline, slowly at first, but later
greatly increasing, DR.. Baker pointed
out.
School Enrolment
The population decline is reflected
in the public school enrollments. For
the past 10 years the enrolment in
the first grades of the nation has
been dropping about 100000 per year,
This decline has now reached the
high schools. There are 20 per cent
fewer births in the nation than 1921
and 1924, the peak years. The war
and postwar conditions may serve to
accelerate even this decline, DR.. Bak-
er said.
Now one thing that history teaches
is that the unencumbered ownership