Evening star., 1943-09-19
Future of Farm Labor Issue
AS Bloc Seeks to Curb FSA
By Marquis ". Childs


Cooley of North Carolina, the commit
tee has concentrated on FSA's co-opera-
tive farms, On the 13 cooperative prof.
ects, four of which are farmed entirely
on cooperative basis, there are only
$50 families. The four full co-operatives
are in Arkansas. They constitute only a
small fraction of the regular work OF
FSA Yet by playing up these projects
and using such smear words as "collec-
tivization" the Cooley committee has
done FSA irreparable harm.
FSA has, of course, bad spots in the
record. For the most part the mistakes
were inherited. Some of them stem
back to the Rural Resettlement Admin
istration which was Rexford Guy Tug
wells brain child. Far too much theo-
rizing went on within the Tugwell organ
ization. Tugwen and the men around
him had the idea that you could build
model town and attract an industry.
The most conspicuous failure was
Highstown, N. j., outside the New York
metropolitan area. Using experimental
SSAAooA
spent exorbitant sums in building what
was to have been model town for un-
employed, garment workers from New
York City. Hightstown had everything
except place to work. Out of these
and other experiments the planners
learned that you can build a town
around an industry but you cannot re-
ments were costly, they could be written
of as education in a trying, transition
period
FSA's major objective in recent years
has been to restore tenant farmers to
independence on their own farms-to
rehabilltate farm families threatened
with economic catastrophe. The steady
trend of recent years has been away
from small farm ownership and toward
increasing tenancy. Large farm units
have become larger. The small farmer
has found it increasingly difficult to COM
pete with the big farmer.
AS part of the program to give the
small farmer better break FSA initi-
ated loans to cooperative associations
and permitted farmer borrowers to use
portion of their FSA loan to join a CO.
op. Small groups were thus enabled to
buy harrow or a tractor or some other
piece OF essential farm machinery. Larger
associations were given loans to buy a
grain terminal or sweet potato starch
factory to help market their produce.
During the past year Congress has cur
tailed this function so that now a bor-
rover may not use FSA funds to Join a
cooperative, although it is still possible
to make loans to small unincorporated
groups.
100000 Receive Loans.
FSA has vigorously defended the re-
Mobilization loan program. More than
100000 farm families have received loans.
FSA employees in the field have worked
closely with them in their attempt to re-
establish independence. Thus fur more
than 25000o families have repaid their
FSA loans in full. A much larger pro-
portion have repaid amounts due, with
total collections running better than 90
per cent Of maturitiks on rehabilitation
loans. .i
While this record is considered highly
satisfactory the FSA is most proud OF
what FSA families have done to increase
the production of essential foodstuffs In
1912 there were 463,941 actively super
vised" borrowers and they constituted
7.6 per cent of all farm families. OF the
total increase Of milk production, those
half million families contributed SO per
cent
While the percentages for other COM
modities are not so startling, they never
theless show that the FSA families are
doing considerably more than their share
in stepping up the output of vital foods.
The rs per cent Of all farm families
contributed II per cent Of the increase
in beef, IT per cent in dry beans, 9 per
cent in chickens, per cent in eggs and
only per cent in pork.
This illustrates another main objective
of the FSA and that is to get farmers
away from the one cash crop system that,
in the opinion of many experts, is re-
sponsible for low standards of wellbeing
in the South. FSA field supervisors work
constantly to bring about cultivation of
food crops rather than cotton of which
there continues to be a surplus.
The main attack in Congress is likely
to concentrate not on liquidation of FSA,
but on restrictions on the loan pro-
gram. There has been talk of limiting
rehabilitation loans to one year. FSA
officials are convinced that this would
make it impossible to carry out any,
thing like their present program.
The pressure on Congress Is continue
(See LABOR, Page C-3)