408 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



get all the figures we can collect of our own, they will see the 

 handwriting on the wall and come out in the open. 



It makes me think of a story Palmer told me the other day — 

 I don't know whether you know Palmer, or not, but he is the 

 man that comes into our office every Sunday to get rid of going 

 to church with his wife. He said he was on a train the other day 

 and there was a man whose head was very bald on top, and 

 around the edge he had a very good growth of hair, and the 

 fellow was doing this (scratching his head), and Palmer reached 

 over and touched him with his finger and said, "Say, Mister, why 

 don't you chase them out in the open?" (Laughter and applause.) 

 Now, we are going to try to drive the other fellows out in the 

 open. (Laughter). 



We have been studying cost of production, and we have found 

 out something about it, and we haven't put our finding under a 

 bushel and hid it, we are telling everybody, and all we want is 

 a fair price compared with that cost of production. Now, we 

 want the manufacturer when he ships a binder to my town in 

 Harrison county, that I may want to buy to put out on my 

 farm, I want the time to come when he is compelled by Congress 

 in some way to mark the cost price on that binder somewhere 

 so that I can tell what it is. (Applause) I want to know what 

 it has cost him, and I am always willing that he make a fair 

 profit out of it. And I want to say to you people that agricul- 

 ture is and will continue to be the basic industry. Today the 

 economic structure is shifted from its base and agriculture is 

 left without sufficient finances or transportation for the proper 

 distribution of the farmers' products. Some of our industries 

 in the United States since the war have been coddled. I don't 

 believe that the government should coddle any industry. The 

 farmer doesn't want to be coddled, but he does want and will have 

 an equal share with the other interests. That means the proper 

 financing of his enterprise and other adjustments in distribution 

 that will eliminate the absorpton of all of the profits in that 

 strip of "no man's land" between the producer and the consumer. 

 We have some in-between fellows in that strip of "no man's 

 land" that will have to change their ways. (Applause). We have 

 plenty of land, plenty of food, plenty of men, and plenty of 

 money; the trouble today, ladies and gentlemen, with the money 

 end of the situation is parallel with the trouble we had in the 

 coal situation last summer. The Iowa Federation studied this 

 coal situation ; Mr. Cunnngham and myself talked this matter 



