484 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



the Farmers' Union, and while we had not anticipated taking very much 

 of your time, yet having met a number of men who have put questions to 

 me that need explanation I will tell you just exactly what the Farmers' 

 Union aims to be. It is an educational, co-operative union, as its name 

 signifies, educational and co-operative. Keep those two thoughts in mind. 



The Farmers' Union originated in Texas something like fifteen or seven- 

 teen years ago. Of course, its growth was slow at first, but finally it got 

 started and took almost a mushroom growth through the South at that 

 time. The probable cause for this was the stand it took on the cotton ques- 

 tion. One state organization after another was added until some twenty- 

 eight or thirty are in existence today, with the membership gone up into 

 a good many hundred thousand. I cannot give you the exact number be- 

 cause when January 1 comes every membership is dead if it is not re- 

 newed. 



In the educational line we carry on social work something after the 

 plan that the Grange has worked out. We have no set, stereotyped form, 

 leaving that to the ingenuity and individuality of the various localities, 

 furnishing them material and urging them to work along these lines. 



There is another phase of educational work, and that is teaching the 

 proper forms of agriculture, improved forms. I must say, however, that 

 so far as organization is concerned, we have almost turned our backs on 

 this, for the reason, not that we do not consider it worth while or neces- 

 sary, but because In this state, as in most states, the state colleges are 

 handling it so well and so thoroughly that we have only found it necessary 

 to co-operate with them to get the best results. 



Then we have the co-operative side — co-operation in both buying and 

 selling. The farmer up to this time has been a class man. The farming 

 business is one of the most important, when you figure its magnitude, of 

 any in the world today. He is the only class man who sells for what he 

 can get and buys for what he has to pay. Isn't that a fact? We go to 

 the market and take what we can get for our produce. We go there and 

 pay whatever we are asked. Show me another business of the magni- 

 tude of the farmer's that doesn't have its cost-plus attached to it. The 

 farmers have been doing business along that line too long. We have been 

 asked too much and we have been paid too little. Secretary Wilson put 

 out a statement at one time to the effect that for every dollar paid by the 

 consumer for the average things consumed the producer received 44 cents, 

 while the rest went to the middle men. The figures are worse than that 

 now since the war came on. It will drop down to 36 or 38 cents. 



There are too many middle men between the producer and the con- 

 sumer, too many men that are making a fat financial harvest that aren't 

 essential in the scheme of distribution. Our general system of distribu- 

 tion is far from perfect. In fact, certain phases of it are nothing short 

 of imposition. There are too many men making money there who have 

 no business there, that aren't necessary, and it is for this reason that the 

 Farmers' Union aims to assist in collective buying. 



We concentrate our forces, our buying power, and buy in large quanti- 

 ties. Today we have a state exchange in this city. We serve all the 

 Farmers' Union men in Iowa who want to buy. Nebraska has an ex- 



