Imperial Valley press., 1943-04-18
SECRET COVENANTS.
SECRETLY ARRIVED AT
This editorial is addressed to-:

This editorial is addressed to:
Farmers. Good, dirt farmers from
inland to Mt. Signal and from the East
Side Highline to the West Side Main.
Big and little, rich and poor =. but farm
ers all.
Farm workers both here and in the
armies. Farm workers, whether II be
cowmen in the north end or carrot top
pers or hay baler contractors or tractor
drivers in the field.
Farm town business men and clerks
and mechanics and public employees
all those who live directly or indirectly
from the produce of the soil.
This is addressed to you and your
wives and your children, because there
is imminent danger that your futures
will be created for you, mapped out and
bargained off and traded in political
deals behind the closed doors of the Unit
ed Nations Food conference at Hot
Springs, Va, next month.
The danger to your future lies not only
in such conference. The real danger
is in the simple TACT that these negotia-
tions are to be secret, hidden from sight
behind a ruling that the newspaper re-
porters of this land of free speech and
public information-these servants OF
yours-won't be allowed to relay to you
what is going on in that conference where
international trades will be made be-
tween the nations of the earth.
THE CONFERENCE IDEA
MAY HAVE MERIT
The proposal tor such a conference
may have real merit. After the war.
feeding the world will be a problem of
the first water. Poor planning may cause
starvation and death and panic and ma
tional breakdowns and lengthy injury
to world economy
1t is true that there may be far too
much planning to suit many OF us. But
this, nowadays, is a planned world and
we are into a new scheme of things and
might as we'll give a real try while we're
at it =. the tide has us and no need to
say it nay It's an old saying that if
YOU give a jackasS enough rope he'll
hang himself, and possibly the sooner
we find out whether this animal of social
reform is going to hang himself, the bet
ter.
But abetting the conference doesn't
mean foregoing our right to witness the
process by which some eventual plan is
to be formulated Just because we con-
cede we should take some medicine,
doesn't excuse us from checking the dos
age. In this country-it may be recalled
the public has voice.
And the people have right to demand
ID6 SAINT lllIliS IOOdy, Just oo Iiiey oi"S5'
have.
Especially is this right of our farm
ers. This is a FOOD conference The
horses to be swapped are the products
of American agriculture.
But the man at the door, the ticket
taker, the ballyhoo artist with the check
cred suit and see-gar says, "NO! You
guys stay out. Run away and ride on the
y-go-round. When we get it all fig
ured out, We'll tell you what WE'VE de-
cided."
We don't believe the farmers will stand
for this They won't stand for it unless
they are willing to take the consequences:
Certainly, if anything ever warranted
direct and hot action by every farm or
ganization in the land, this case does.
If whatever kinds of cards are dealt
behind the doors of the conference can
not stand the light of day, then those
cards should be put back where they
came FROM or better, burned up and the
ashes thrown away.
PUBLIC INFORMATION IS
PUBLIC SAFETY
Such kinds of dangers as this are the
dangers which beset the path Of nations
which do not have freedom Of speech
and press.