Page Four 



THE 1. A. A. RECORD 



industry and finance would have been 

 helped more if proper attention had 

 been g^iven to the condition of agricul- 

 ture. Nothing of substance has been 

 done to bring this basic part of our 

 national life into conformity with the 

 economic system that has been set up 

 by law. Government should interfere 

 as little as possible with business. But 

 if it does interfere with one phase of 

 economic life, be it by tariff, by assis- 

 tance to merchant marine, by control 

 of the flow of money and capital 

 through the banking system, it is bad 

 logic, bad economics and an abandon- 

 ment of government responsibility to 

 say that as to agriculture alone, the 

 government should not aid. 



Co-ordinated Marketing Needed 



"Twice a Republican Congress has 

 passed legislation only to have it 

 vetoed by a President of their own 

 party, and whether the veto of that 

 specific measure was right or wrong, 

 it is undisputed that no adequate sub- 

 stitute was ever recommended to the 

 Congress by the president and that no 

 constructive plan of relief was ever 

 formulated by any leader of the Re- 

 publican party in place of the plan 

 which its Congress passed and its Presi' 

 dent vetoed. Only caustic criticism 

 and bitter denunciation were provoked 

 in the minds of the Republican leaders 

 in answer to the nation-wide appeal 

 for a sane endeavor to meet this crisis. 



"Co-operative, co-ordinated market- 

 ing and warehousing of surplus farm 

 products is essential, just as co-ordi- 

 nated, co-operative control of the flow 

 of capital was found necessary to the 

 regulation of our country's finances. 

 To accomplish financial stability, the 

 federal reserve system was called into 

 being by a Democratic administration. 

 The question for agriculture is com- 

 plex. Any plan devised must also be 

 co-ordinated with the other phases of 

 our business institutions. Our plat- 

 form declares for the development of 

 co-operative marketing and an earnest 

 endeavor to solve the problem of the 

 distribution of the cost of dealing with 

 crop surpluses over the marketed unit 

 of the crop whose producers are bene- 

 fited by such assistance. 



Pledge* Immediate Action 



"Only the mechanics remain to be 

 devised. I propose to substitute action 

 for inaction, and friendliness for hos- 

 tility. In my administration of the 

 government of my state, whenever I 

 was confronted with a problem of this 

 character, I called into conference 

 those best equipped on the particular 

 subject in hand. I shall follow that 

 course with regard to agriculture. 



"Farmers and farm leaders, with 

 such constructive aid as will come 



from sound economists and fair-mind- 

 ed leaders of finance and business, 

 must work out the detail. There are 

 varying plans for the attain^nt of the 

 end which is to be accomplished. Such 

 plans should be subjected at once to 

 searching, able and fair-minded analy- 

 sis, because the interests of all require 

 that the solution shall be economically 

 sound. 



"If I am elected, I shall immediately 

 after election ask leaders of the type 

 I have named, irrespective of party, 

 to enter upon this task. I shall join 

 with them in the discharge of their 

 duties during the coming winter and 

 present to Congress, immediately upon 

 its convening, the solution recommend- 

 ed by the body of men best fitted to 

 render this signal service to the na- 

 tion. I shall support the activities of 

 this body until a satisfactory law is 

 placed upon the statute books." 



Statement Issued 

 by President Sam 



H. Thompson 



American Farm Bureau Federation 



GOVERNOR SMITH in kis 

 acceptance speech last 

 night recited facts that clearly 

 represent the present agricaltur- 

 al situation. 



He reiterated the Democratic 

 party pledge adopted at Houston. 

 As I have already said, that 

 party platform covers the funda- 

 mental principles adopted by the 

 American Farm Bureau Federa- 

 tion five years ago. 



The avoidance of Government 

 subsidy by assessing the cost of 

 surplus control to the product 

 benefited is fundamental. 



Governor Smith's plan to find 

 a way of spreading the market- 

 ing costs over the marketed unit 

 of the commodity benefited is 

 satisfactory. 



Nearly Two Million 



Leave Farms in 1927 



THE Bureau of Agricultural Eco- 

 nomics estimates that 1,978,000 

 persons left farms last year compared 

 with 2,165,000 in 1926, and 1,900,000 

 in 1926. Offsetting this movement, 

 1,374,000 persons moved from cities 

 to farms last year compared with 

 1,136,000 in 1926, and 1,066,000 in 

 1926. 



These figures show a net movement 

 of 604,000 persons from farms to 

 cities for 1927 compared with 1,020,- 

 000 persons in 1926, and 834,000 per- 

 sons in 1926. Only a small reduction, 

 however, is shown in farm popula- 

 tion, an excess of births over deaths 

 bringing the population to 27,699,000 



THE PRESS SAYS 



THAT LONGING FOR MR. 

 LOWDEN 



Recently Gov. Smith, in addressing 

 certain spokesmen for agriculture, 

 named Frank 0. Lowden as one of the 

 intellectual leaders and practical 

 farmers whom he would ask to serve 

 on a committee of experts to be ap- 

 pointed at once, in the event of his 

 election, to devise a solution of the 

 complex and difficult farm-relief prob- 

 lem. 



In his speech on that problem the 

 other day at West Branch, Iowa, Mr. 

 Hoover remarked that "outstanding 

 farmers such as Gov. Lowden would 

 be asked to join in the search for com- 

 mon ground upon which we can act." 



The assiduous cultivation of Mr. 

 Lowden by both candidates and both 

 parties is one of the features of the 

 campaign which is not devoid of 

 humor for the observer. Mr. Low- 

 den's aid and advice would be both 

 scientific and practical, but the value 

 of his political support is not under- 

 estimated by either anxious aspirant 

 to Presidential honors. 



While awaiting some sign from the 

 eminent Illinoisan both candidates and 

 their respective campaign managers 

 might study with profit the many 

 speeches, magazine articles and state- 

 ments which Mr. Lowden has contrib- 

 uted to the discussion of the farm 

 problem. They should ponder espe- 

 cially his insistence upon what he calls 

 the penalty clauses of farm-relief leg- 

 islation, upon the necessity of distrib- 

 uting the cost of surplus control over 

 all the beneficiaries and upon prevent- 

 ing abuse of devised remedies by self- 

 ish, stubborn, narrow-minded or short- 

 sighted farmers who, avid to take ad- 

 vantage of others' costly co-operative 

 efforts, have no scruples about neutral- 

 izing those efforts by grabbing profits 

 in their own good time while contrib- 

 uting nothing to the common welfare. 



Investigation of the obvious would 

 be a waste of time and effort The 

 crux of the problem is known and 

 should not be dodged. The urgent need 

 is for some workable substitute for 

 the equalization fee of the McNary- 

 Haugen bill. — Chicago Daily News. 



persons on January 1, 1928, compared 

 with 27,892,000 on January 1, 1927, 

 a decrease of 193,000 persons, com- 

 pared with a decrease of 649,000 in 

 1926, and 441,000 in 1925. 



A survey made last winter shows 

 that 87 per cent of those moving from 

 cities to farms had had farm experi- 

 ence. 



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