PROCEEDINGS CORN BELT MEAT PRODUCERS' ASSN. 517 



is especially appropriate in view of the fact that it seems to me in a dim 

 recollection of the past that it has been repeated over this state that I 

 have favored the Cummins-Esch law. 



"Whereas, Congress is contemplating legislation which will have the 

 effect of guaranteeing to the stockholders and bondholders of railroad 

 securities a six per cent net return upon their book value or upon the 

 cost of reproducing the railroads of the United States, which will entail 

 increased passenger and freight rates that will produce a net revenue of 

 more than $200,000,000 over and above the profits guaranteed during 

 the war — " 



Remember that said there "would have the effect of guaranteeing," 

 we did not say "guaranteeing them." On that subject, just a word. 

 What effect did it have? Was it helpless, meaning nothing, as some have 

 stated? A few months afterwards there was a case pending before the 

 Interstate Commerce Commission, involving the freight rates on live 

 stock, and the Interstate Commerce Commission used that law as the 

 controlling factor and declined to grant the reduction. 



A few months after the enactment of this law, it was quoted in another 

 decision in which the commission granted the most tremendous ad- 

 vance in freight rates that has ever been made in this or any other 

 country since the steam engine was invented, and it was made at a time 

 when everybody else in this nation was being forced to reduce their 

 prices. Later, by the creation of a national sentiment, through this or- 

 ganization and other organization meeting from the Pacific to the Atlan- 

 tic, by the passage of resolutions, by the making of speeches, and then 

 by the trial of a case, we did succeed in persuading the commission to 

 ignore the law and to grant a reduction which was not challenged. Let 

 us proceed just a moment with these resolutions: 

 held directly responsible for the advanced rates which must follow; and 



"And, Whereas, If this law is enacted, the present congress must be 

 this congress must further be held directly responsible for a further ad- 

 vance in wages which will be the inevitable sequel, and all the other 

 after-effects of such absurd legislation; and, 



"Whereas, Congress should give as much consideration to the rights 

 of the farmers of the United States as they give to the railroad security 

 holders. There being a decrease in the wheat area under cultivation 

 which has been estimated at 23 per cent, and a decrease in the number 

 of brood sows because of the uncertainty in future after-the-war condi- 

 tions, all of which will cause a substantial decline in the breadstuffs and 

 meats of the nation which today and from time immemorial have been 

 about as essential to the welfare of America as locomotives and cars; 

 therefore, be it 



"Resolved, That we ask our representatives in congress to immediately 

 enact legislation dividing the country into farm zones or districts, and 

 guaranteeing the farmers in the aggregate, in each zone or district for 

 the period of two years from the effective date of the legislation, a net 

 return of 5% per cent profit, plus one-half per cent for new fences and 

 barns; and that the said total of 6 per cent shall be above all taxes and 

 above all cost of labor and supplies, and that it shall be computed upon 



