REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF AGRICULTURE. 47 



To a certain extent, we are still pioneering the continent, agricul- 

 turally and otherwise, and are still exporters of food, feedstuffs, and 

 materials for clothing. With wise foresight and increased employ- 

 ment of scientific practice, under the stimulation of intelligent agencies, 

 we can take care of and provide for a very much larger population 

 under even more favorable circumstances and in greater prosperity. 

 This is the task to which the Nation has set itself and indicates the 

 responsibility resting upon each individual, and especially upon the 

 farming population and State and Federal agencies responsible for 

 leadership. We have, up to the present, succeeded in this enterprise. 

 In the years from 1900 to 1915 the Nation gained a popu- 

 lation of approximately 22,000,000, and they have been fed and 

 clothed in large measure from domestic sources. It is estimated that 

 in the years from 1915 to 1918 the population increased by 

 3,200,000, of which a very small part was from immigration. 

 We shall, perhaps, gain as many more in the next 15 or 20 years, 

 even if the rate of immigration should not be maintained, for the 

 natural growth in recent years, averaging about three-fourths of a 

 million a year, shows an upward tendency. 



It would be desirable to facilitate land settlement in more orderly 

 fashion. This can be effected in a measure by systematic effort on 

 the part of the Federal Government, the States, and the several com- 

 munities through appropriate agencies to furnish more reliable infor- 

 mation, intelligent guidance, and well-considered settlement plans. 

 The Nation has suffered not a little from irresponsible and haphazard 

 private direction of settlement. In many sections, especially in the 

 newer and more rapidly developing pnes, the situation has been com- 

 plicated by the activities of promoters whose main concern was to 

 dispose of their properties. They too frequently succeeded in attract- 

 ing farmers to localities remote from markets where they either 

 failed to produce crops or met with disaster through lack of market 

 outlets or adequate marketing arrangements. 



It is particularly vital that, by every feasible means, the processes 

 of acquiring ownership of farms be encouraged and hastened. This 

 process is real in spite of appearances to the contrary. It has been 

 too generally assumed and represented that tenancy has increased 

 at the expense of ownership and that we are witnessing agricultural 

 deterioration in this direction. Tenancy does present aspects which 

 should cause great concern, but its bright sides have not been suffi- 



