Year: 1878




Residents of ST. Paul and other cities
sometimes ask of what interest the wheat
question is to them-why they should grow
excited over the wrongs done to farmers by
the Minneapolis Millers' association. They
seem to forget that, though they may be
living in large CITY and engaged in line
of business in which they have no direct
connection with the farmers, they are still
| vitally interested in the prosperity of the
tillers of the soil, and ought to feel deep
concern for their welfare. 1t is fact that
no sensible person will deny, that when the
farmer has good crops and gets good prices
for the products of his toll all other lines of
business experience a revival. If he pros
pers, he feels able to lay out money for ma
chinery and stock upon his farm, to refur-
nish his house, perhaps, and indulge in bet
ter clothing for both himself and his family.
He is able to pay his debts to the local
storekeeper; he in turn ig able to meet his
obligations to the wholesale merchant and
increase his stock; while the wholesaler is
able to pay the manufacturer and otherwise
grease the wheels Of industry. If the farmer
has poor crops, or gets poor prices for his
wheat and his corn, the reverse is the case.
So it will appear that every man, woman and
child in this city is interested in the pros
perity Of the farmer, and an injury
done to him is an injury done
to every business man, every
mechanic, every laboring man, and every
professional man in the community. We all
suffer when the farmer suffers; when he is
robbed we all feel the evil effects of it.


One result of the systematic swindling of
the farmers by the Minneapolis Millers' as
sociation is to be seen in the general stagna-
ton of trade. Knowing that they are being
robbed by the widening of grades and by
false measures and weights, the farmers re-
fuse to sell their wheat. Although two
months have elapsed since the harvest, less
than two hundred thousand bushels of wheat
have been marketed along the line of the
st. Paul & Pacific railroad. The amount
ought to be two millions OF more, and would
undoubtedly have reached those figures but
for the fact that the farmers are being
robbed. The marketing of two million
bushels of wheat would put OF least million
and quarter dollars in circulation in this
State. Business would receive an impetus
that would be felt in every department. of in
dustry. The merchant would have quicker
and larger sales, the manufacturer would
have more work for the laboring men to do
and be better able to pay them, and every
mechanic and laboring man in the State
would find his prospects brighter. But what
ought to have been marketed in the last two
months is now lying idle in the farmers
bins-dead capital that is doing nobody any
good.


The farmers have marketed only enough
of their crop to meet their present pressing
necessities. They will continue the same
policy as long as they are refused fair
price for their crop. They acknowledge
that the quality of their wheat is inferior to
what it was last year, but they know that it
is not Of as low grade as the swindling
brass kettles, manipulated by the agents of
the Minneapolis Millsrs' association, pretend
that it is. They know that they are offered
No. price for wheat which, if honestly
graded, would pass for No. 2. Knowing this
they do right in Withholding their grain
from the market. Every man in similar cir
cumstances would do the same.


AS every person in every community is
interested in the farmers cause-is yitally
affected when they are robbed-1t behooves
them to go to work to remedy the evil.
There is but one way to put a stop to this
systematic swindling. That is, to send men
to the State legislature and to Congress who
will advocate such legislation as will hold
the monopolies and their agents in check.
1t is a political question, pure and simple,
and cannot be withdrawn from politics. All
efforts to remedy the evils will be abortive
if the people elect to Office men who are in
terested in maintaining the power of the
ring. All apologists for or defenders of the
Millers' association, including Washburn,
the head and front of it, must be invited to
take a back seat. The watchword must be:
Down with Washburn and the syindIino
brass kettles and all who uphold them.


THE DIFFERENCE.