212 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



spondence with some of the legislators in Missouri, and they have evolved 

 a scheme down there to have a live stock commissioner who is to have 

 jurisdiction over the stockyards and all the charges of the affiliated con- 

 cerns in those markets. A very strong delegation of Kansas City com- 

 mission firms went down to try to beat it, but it will probably be pretty 

 difficult to oppose the creation of an independent bureau of that kind 

 to investigate and regulate such charges. I suggest that this great state 

 of Iowa ought to take some action regarding the stock yards within your 

 own borders, and perhaps then you can get the Illinois people to do the 

 same thing. It is the only way you can correct these continual advances 

 of commission charges. You have got to organize and be prepared to 

 beat these combinations, and if you can beat them through the means 

 of proper laws, so much the better. 



I want to refer to western land conditions, which I think ought to 

 be of as much interest to you as it is to us western people. You get your 

 best live stock, so they tell me, from the western range. You know the 

 ranges have been cut up; possibly you also know that the high prices the 

 past few years have resulted in a great many of these range men cleaning 

 up. Since they have done that, they have never had a chance to get back 

 in, and a good many don't want to go back under the old free range con- 

 ditions, where the grass belongs to everybody, and nobody protects. Those 

 of you who have traveled in the west know very well that the semi-arid 

 country there is not like Iowa; it is never going to be settled up in 

 prosperous farms. Possibly there may be some successful dry farming 

 done. One of the potent factors contributing to this decrease in live 

 £tock in the west is the very unsatisfactory range conditions. Our as- 

 sociation has been trying for years to get some kind of federal control 

 of the open range similar to the supervision that runs on the forest re- 

 serve system, whereby a man can lease and fence and prove and watch his 

 land, and thereby increase the production of a specified amount of land. 

 It has been estimated by well-informed range men that the open range 

 could produce fifty per cent more live stock of all kinds under the lease 

 law than at present. You have as much interest in that land as Col- 

 orado or Wyoming has; you are interested in all the national resources, 

 for Iowa helped pay for this public land, as well as other western states.; 

 and I hope you will pass some resolutions along that line. This, I am 

 sure, will contribute to increase the production of live stock, and tend to 

 avoid the necessity for putting meats on the free list. 



Last summer I was in Washington on a good many matters, and hap- 

 pened to be down there at the time this free feeder rate case was being 

 tried. I was the only live stock man before the Interstate Commerce 

 Commission on that very important matter At the same time an attack 

 was being made on the meat inspection by some wild-haired man who 

 claimed the government was permitting a lot of impure meats to be 

 sold. Our association looked after that very creditably, because the bill 

 never got out of the committee. There are hundreds of things of that 

 character which our organization looks after. I personally try a great 

 many rate cases involving western railroad rates. Our organization 



