President Roosevelt Talks 

 Plainly About the AAA 



Some Folks Are Lying Abouf The Farm Program, He Says 



PRESIDENT Rooscnelfs scath- 

 ing denunciation of enemies of 

 Die AAA. and his umiiialified 

 support of the adjustment pro- 

 gram in his speech to more than 1,- 



000 farmers in front of the White 

 House, May 11, is one of the im- 

 portant develoiiments in the na- 

 tional fight being waged in behalf 

 of the Act and the pending amend- 

 ments. 



Reviewing conditions which led 

 to the passage of the Act and th'' 

 plans advanced to solve the farm- 

 ers" problem, the President said, 

 "Go back a minute to the spring 

 of 10:'>:5 when there was a huge 

 carryover of almost i:],000.000 

 bales of cotton and a jirice of six 

 cents a pound. You and I know 

 what six cent cotton means to the 

 purchasing power of the cotton 

 belt. There was a huge carrj-ovor 

 of tobacco and the price of tobacco 

 during the preceding ■six months 

 was the lowest on record for nian\' 

 years. 



"Wheat with a carryover of 

 nearly 100.000.000 bushels and a 

 price of .3.5 cents on the farm : 

 corn with a price of 1.5 cents a 

 bushel on many farms ; hogs sell- 

 ing at three cents a pound ; you and 



1 know what that meant in the way 

 of purchasing power for 40,000.000 

 people. 



"When we came to Washington 

 we were faced with three possible 

 programs. The first involved price 

 fixing by government decree. This 

 was discarded because the iiroblcm 

 of overproduction was not solved 

 thereby. 



"The second was a plan to let 

 farmers grow as much as tho.\- 

 wanted to and to have federal gov- 

 ernment .step in, take from them 

 that portion of their crop which 

 represented the exportable surplus 

 and, in their name, on their behalf, 

 dump this surplus on the other na- 

 tions of the world. 



"That plan was discarded be- 

 cause the other nations of the 



world had already begun to stop 

 dumping. With increasing fre- 

 (luency they were raising their 

 tarifts, establishing quotas and 

 clamping on embargoes against 

 just that kind of propo.sition. 



"Therefore, we came to the third 

 plan — a plan for the adjustment of 

 totals in our major crops so that 

 from year to year production and 

 consumption would be kept in rea- 

 sonable balance with each other to 

 the end that reasonable prices 

 would be paid to farmers for their 

 croi)s and to the end that unwieldy 

 surpluses would not depress our 

 markets and upset the balance. 



"We are now at the beginning 

 of the thii'd year of carrying out 

 this policy. You know the results 

 thus far attained. You know the 

 price of cotton, of wheat, of to- 

 bacco, of corn, of hogs and of other 

 farm products today. Further com- 

 ment on the successful partial at- 

 tainment of our objective up to this 

 time is unnecessary on my part, 

 vou know. 



As PrcsHli-nt Roosevcl' sprkc to an aurtl^nre esti- 

 mated at moi** tjiati 4.000 larm^rs mostly from 

 the cotton and tobaoo belt, ass-Tiblcd is front 

 of the Whi-.c Hous, - May 14 



"I want to empha.si/e that word 

 'adjustment." ,\s you know, a 

 great many of the high and mighty 

 — with special axes to grind — have 

 been deliberately trying to mislead 

 people who know nothing of farm- 

 ing by misrepresenting — no; — why 

 use a pussyfoot word? — by lying 

 about the kind of a farm program 

 under which this nation is operat- 

 ing today. 



"A few leading citizens have 

 gone astray from ignoranc(\ I must 

 admit it. For «'xampl(>: The promi- 

 nent cit.\' banker who was driving 

 through upstate New York with 

 me four or five years ago in the 

 late 1-alI. Everying was brown. 

 The leaves were off the trees. We 

 passed a beautiful green field. He 

 asked me what it was. I told him 

 it was Winter wheat. He turned to 

 me and said, 'That is very interest- 

 ing. I have always wondered about 

 Winter wheat. What I don't under- 

 stand is how they are al)le to cut 

 it when it gets all covei-ed up with 

 snow.' 



"The other was the editor of a 

 great metropolitan paper. Ho 

 visited me down in (ieorgia when 

 the cotton was nearly grown but 

 before the bolls had formed. Look- 







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V 1 1 



JUNE, IM.i 



