LIVE STOCK BREEDERS* ASSOCIATION. I25 



Have you a coin about you, asked the wit. Yes, said the laborer and 

 handed him a new coin. The wit went up to the metal counter and 

 rang the coin. "Is that good money?" he asked the cook. "Yes," re- 

 sponded the cook. "Well, you are paid," said the wit. The laborer has 

 had the vapor of your goose and you have had the ring of his coin. 



In the case of the strike the packers had the vaporings of the union 

 and tlie strikers failed to get even the ring of the coin, and the cattle 

 raisers and feeders suffered more or less than either. We undoubtedly 

 held the bag. 



Before leaving this subject of the packing industry, I would ask my 

 hearers if they have not read two articles published in Wallace's Farmer 

 of December 22 issue, to get the paper and read them. One is by ex- 

 Governor Larabee on the railroads and the other by A. L. Ames, presi- 

 dent of the Meat Producers' Association, both of Iowa. The former 

 emphasizes the fact that competition can no longer be depended on to 

 regulate freight rates. That the government must have the power to 

 regulate the freight rates, or the government must own the roads. He 

 says no other, even half civilized country, would tolerate such high- 

 handed robbery, as less than half a score of irresponsible persons dictate 

 and control the traffic and tax every business for their profit. We know 

 that the greatest bar to distributing our thoroughbred cattle is the ex- 

 cessive freight rates imposed. At the World's Fair the good lot of cattle 

 sold by the different breeders was discounted in price fully one-fourth 

 by the buyers having to pay such excessive terminal charges to get the 

 cattle from the fair grounds to the roads over which they were to be 

 shipped home. 



Mr. A. L. Ames speaks of the longer time it now takes to get beef 

 cattle shipped to market and the rebates that Swift and Armour get in 

 their shipments, proving that the two, the transportation and packing 

 companies are in collusion to collect tribute from the shippers. The 

 shrinkage in these dilatory hauls takes money out of the shipper's pocket 

 and puts it in the packer's safe. This all proves that the breeder has 

 other work to look after besides raising good stock. 



We now ask the question pertinently, is there any sentiment in 

 business traffic, commerce or trade, or any other name you may call the 

 distribution of products? I assert that the golden rule or the decalogue 

 has little place in modern business methods. I know I may be censured 

 as strongly as was Senator Ingalls of Kansas, in his travesty on modern 

 politics, yet the history of the industrial world bears me out in my as- 

 sertion. It seems to be every fellow, or combination of fellows for 

 themselves, and the devil take the hindmost. It is war to the knife 

 and from the knife to the hilt. Why are the agriculturists com- 



