CITY AND COUNTRY— II 



Effects of Human Environments on the Progress of Civilization' 



O. F. Cook 

 Bureau of Plant Industry, U. S. Department of Agriculture 



THE city needs to study the country 

 and the country the city, instead 

 merely traditional, conventional 

 ideas being accepted on either side. 

 Individual interest or preference for 

 the city or the country should not 

 keep us from seeing the different sides 

 of the practical questions. 



The relative advantages of urban 

 and rural life have been debated for 

 centuries with no better prospect of a 

 conclusion being reached than in other 

 questions of taste and habit. It means 

 little in itself that country people 

 generally prefer to live in the country 

 and city people in the city. All primi- 

 tive people believe instinctively that 

 their own life is the best. The naked 

 savages wandering in murky tropical 

 forests, the Arabs in their desert sands, 

 and the Esquimaux in their snowfields, 

 are as firmly convinced as any civilized 

 man that their special way of living is 

 the most to be desired. To prefer what 

 we know and to dread everything else, 

 is the instinctive attitude of the mind. 

 The narrower our existence becomes, 

 the more difficult it is to diverge from 

 the routine path. To break with one's 

 habits, as the French say, is regarded 

 as a supreme misfortune. The instinct 

 of self-preservation that ties us so 

 strongly to life also makes our own 

 existence the standard of individual 

 preference, which we assume that 

 others should share, even against their 

 will. 



LABOR AND CAPITAL CONCENTRATIXG 

 IN CITIES 



Cities present many "attractions," 

 to get more people to come in and 

 contribute their money or their labor, 

 so that industries, business and 

 property values may increase. This is 

 natural and inevitable, seeing that 

 cities are not self-supporting, but must 



' This is the second of the two articles on this subject by Mr. Cook, the first paper having 

 appeared in the previous issue of the Journal. The itaHcs in this paper, as in the first, are the 

 editor's. — Editor. 



167 



draw upon the country. The industrial 

 excuse for large cities is becoming less, 

 with improved facilities of communica- 

 tion and electric transmission of power, 

 but people are crowding into the urban 

 centers faster than ever, and no 

 devices are spared to "keep them com- 

 ing." "Get ready for the Big City 

 now," as the porter says when the 

 train approaches Los Angeles. Instead 

 of finding ways to resist or to counter- 

 act this movement, remission of taxes 

 is being asked, to stimulate the building 

 of tenements, especially in the largest 

 cities. 



Continued dominance of urban ideas 

 means that we shall become more and 

 more urbanized, that capital and labor 

 will concentrate more and more in 

 cities, and that rural population and 

 production may soon enter generally 

 upon the stage of decline which many 

 districts are showing. In the last ten 

 years urban population has increased 

 more than seven times as fast as rural 

 population. With two-thirds of the 

 people of the United States living in 

 the cities and towns, the time certainly 

 has come for considering the remnant 

 of farm population, instead of continu- 

 ing to subsidize urban development 

 at the expense of agriculture. The 

 reasons that have justified tariffs and 

 other direct advantages of urban 

 industries in the past are still applic- 

 able to particular cases, but their 

 general purpose has been attained and 

 over-shot. A vast industrial system 

 has been established, and we have 

 gone beyond the equilibrium of agri- 

 culture, manufactures and commerce 

 that statesmen of former generations 

 considered essential to our independ- 

 ence. 



Tariffs protect against foreign com- 

 petition, but leave the farmer fully 

 exposed to urban exploitation. War- 



