Seventy-Third Annual Report 1285 



There are billions of dollars of these land bonds in circulation 

 in Europe, and wherever the farmers have issued them for the 

 purpose of capitalizing their banks, money has been both cheap 

 and plentiful, and agriculture very much more prosperous. 



A land bond for one million dollars will readily secure five hun- 

 dred thousand dollars in cash, and with this capital a farmers' 

 bank is created in the county or province where the members of the 

 league reside. Under this system farmers' national banks could 

 be created in this country the same as ordinary national banks. 

 These land bonds could be deposited with the federal govern- 

 ment as security against the issuance of national bank notes and 

 present a higher and more gilt edge collateral than the usual se- 

 curities deposited with the government for the issuance of national 

 bank notes. 



Loans in these various systems of banks are granted for short 

 periods of 3, and 9 months, or for longer periods of 1, 2 and 

 3 years. 



This enables the small farmer to manage his affairs on a spot 

 cash basis, and encourages the larger landowner to equip his 

 farm with modern machinery and conduct his business in such a 

 way as to secure all the profits to Avhich he is legitimately entitled. 

 The long-time loans also enaMe farmers to purchase and gradually 

 pay for their farms. It means a system of cooperative effort, not 

 alone in the furnishing of cash capital to each farmer at a low 

 rate of interest, to j)lant, cultivate and harvest his crop, but it 

 means cooperative effort in marketing the products of the farm at 

 profitable values to each producer. 



In Germany alone, last year, these three systems of agricultural 

 cooperative banks did a business among the farmers of over five 

 million dollars, and Germany is comparatively a small country. 



What we need is capital in abundance, and which we can secure 

 by the enactment of laws which will permit the farmers to liquify 

 their assets, the same as the merchants and manufacturers, and 

 which has been so successfully done in European countries for 

 the past fifty years. 



There are no trusts in Europe which handle farm products. 

 There can be none. Under these systems of rural finance and 



