438 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



millions of dollars, and undertake to sell them in the markets of New 

 York, they would put him in an asylum as a crazy man, too. 



What is the mysterious thing that turns the trick? What is the key 

 that opens the door? But when he issues against these mortgages Farm 

 Loan Bonds and the bank at Omaha puts these bonds on the market as 

 representing the mortgages back yonder — we haven't had any trouble, 

 have we, Mr. Hogan, to sell them, until last March, when a great estab- 

 lishment in this country, with an over-weening love for the tax-payers of 

 this great country, conceived the Idea that the Farm Loan Bonds were 

 tax free, and if we kept on at that thing the country would go skidding 

 down the hill, and this institution instituted a suit in the Circuit Court 

 at Kansas City. That suit was promptly turned down by the Circuit 

 Court, and the case is now before the Supreme Court of the United 

 States. It was argued today one year ago — this is my birthday, ladies 

 and gentlemen — I don't look as old as you think I am, do I — the case 

 was re-argued in October, and decision has not been handed down. And 

 since that time we haven't been able to sell any bonds. We haven't been 

 trying to, when we know we couldn't sell them. And do you know what 

 has happened? And it is possible to say this because we are just talk- 

 ing together — if we had been operating during the past ten months, from 

 March to this time, on the same basis we were operating in March, at the 

 rate of 15-millions per month, we would have loaned to the farmers of this 

 country 150-million dollars at 5i^%, on an annual repayment basis for 

 34 years, and if the economists in whom we have confidence are right 

 that one dollar of money w^ill liquidate five dollars of debt, that would 

 have meant through the Federal Land Banks alone, to say nothing of the 

 29 Joint Stock Land Banks, we should have loaned to the American 

 farmers 150-million dollars, with which they would have been enabled in 

 the country to liquidate 750-million dollars. (Laughter.) That is more 

 money than I ever had. (Laughter.) 



Listen, my friends! It is a serious thing, and I don't want the farmers 

 of Iowa to forget, when we begin operating again, how it happens that 

 this system has been tied up since last March, and who it was that in- 

 stituted the suit. And I wish further to say, my friends, that the Ameri- 

 can people are so thoroughly committed to this system of long-time credit 

 upon farm mortgages, a system which enables them to finance themselves 

 with such ease, and which is enabling so many young men to acquire 

 homes in certain sections of the country at least, this institution to the 

 contrary, notwithstanding, that a farm loan system is going to be a part 

 of the policy of this government, — the world, the flesh and the devil to the 

 contrary, notwithstanding. (Applause.) 



Now, what happens? What do we do? We get your mortgages to- 

 gether; we issue bonds, and we sell that bond and from the proceeds of 

 the sale of that bond we loan you the money. It's easy, isn't it? It has 

 worked to such an extent that we have loaned more than 440-million 

 dollars in three years of actual operation. We have loaned through the 

 bank at Omaha in the great state of Iowa 23-million dollars — more than 

 any other state in the Union, except Texas, and she is not a state, she is 

 an empire. (Laughter.) And I am proud to tell you tonight that Mr. 



