REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER. 9 



CONFLICTING OPINIONS ABOUT FARMING. 



The man who Hves in the city and works for day pay in an 

 estabHshed industry and hves in a rented home, moving spring 

 and fall from one location to another, loses the instinct of at- 

 tachment to locality. He does not attempt with his own hand 

 or by his own effort, to fix up or beautify any residence that he 

 may occupy. He demands this to be done for him by the land- 

 lord, if it is done at all. His instincts change from home to 

 community instincts which demand schools, highways, streets 

 and public service and that these be made for him. His im- 

 pression of the farm is, that it is simply a place to produce food, 

 and an abundance of it, so that it shall be cheap. He believes 

 the farmer, inasmuch as he has a property investment in the 

 land and house that he owns, to be under a moral obligation 

 to produce food. This has become a settled conviction with the 

 people who work for a living. 



There is another class living in the cities who increase their 

 earnings from investments in industrial stocks, or railroad 

 stocks, or steamship stocks, or loaning money in this direction, 

 that direction, or the other direction, or who are allied with 

 banks and banking interests, that have been taught by their 

 associations to look upon the farm as an industrial unit and they 

 continually ask, "Why doesn't this farmer use business meth- 

 ods? Why doesn't he produce sufficient produce so that its 

 transportation over our railroad and steamship lines would en- 

 able these companies to pay big dividends on their stocks? 

 Why doesn't the farmer become simply a freight producer?" 



Opposed to these conditions are the inborn and ingrained 

 traditions of the farmer, himself. He owns his farm and oper- 

 ates it as a home — not for the purpose of producing freight 

 that railroads may declare big dividends by hauling it to mar- 

 ket, or that food shall be cheap in the cities. These two things 

 concern him little. This piece of land with the house and barn, 

 comprises his home and to this home instinct everything on 

 that farm is subordinate. Business principles have not — and 

 it is safe to say never will — supersede the idea, "this is my 

 home." If he makes money, well and good. It be does not, it 

 is still his home and he cuts his expenses to the size of his 

 income. The State of Maine is to be congratulated that, up to 

 the present, the agricultural community is a stable community 

 with the home instinct. 



