AFBF Meeting 



(Continued jrom page 4) 



pose our own Secretary of Agriculture 

 whom we honor and respect for his 

 great constructive work on behalf of 

 agriculture. Secretary Wallace favors 

 big granary supplies, and we just can't 

 go along with him on that idea." 



Substituting for Senator Pope, Earl 

 Smith on Tuesday delivered on short 

 notice a vigorous explanation and de- 

 fense of the Farm Bureau's AAA of 

 1937 known as the Pope McGill bill. 

 His fighting speech was described by 

 many as "the best delivered at the con- 

 vention." (See excerpts in this issue.) 



Senator Arthur Capper sent his ad- 

 dress on "World Peace" to the con- 

 vention to be read, and Senator Berry 

 of Tennessee likewise failed to appear 

 to talk on the relationship between 

 labor and agriculture. Clifford Gregory 

 was called on to pinch hit for the pro- 

 gram which he did in his usual able 

 and effective style. He advised the 

 Federation to keep up the fight for 

 parity prices, asserted that "the share 

 of the consumer's dollar it takes to 

 pay for parity corn, wheat, and cotton 

 is a small one" but that the effect of 

 shrinking farm buying on city employ- 

 ment and earnings is apparent every- 

 where. He closed by suggesting that 

 organized farmers acquire their own 

 radio station. 



Common Sense 



Marriner Eccles, chairman of the 

 Federal Reserve Board was eventually 

 located wandering around in the lobby 

 of the hotel while his audience awaited 

 him upstairs, '''ne short-statured banker 

 and capitalist from Utah, a slow and 

 deliberate speaker, proceeded to get 

 off a lot of common sense philos- 

 ophy with a clean-cut analysis of busi- 

 ness conditions. He said our greatest 

 problem is to equitably distribute what 

 we produce; that failing in this we 

 find production soon getting ahead of 

 consumption. Industry, he said, had 

 controlled production and price 

 through monopoly — while agriculture 

 had been largely unable to defend it- 

 self through similar action 



Eccles opposed the theory that taxes 

 were the cause of the present "reces- 

 sion" in business. The rapid increase 

 last spring in the cost of building ma- 

 terials and labor which advanced de- 

 spite only a 40% gain in construction 

 all but stopped the biggest single busi- 

 ness in America, he said. Railroads, 

 too, quit buying because overhead due 

 mostly to higher wage scales increased 

 faster than income. The reduction in 

 government expenditures was another 

 cause he gave for the business decline. 



"I am not saying that certain taxes 

 should not be modified," Eccles said. 



"but I am sure that these changes will 

 not make much difference in business 

 prosperity. Reducing the undistributed 

 profits tax is likely to be deflationary. 

 There has been too much accumulation 

 of idle reserves by large corporations. 

 Good times come when credit expands. 

 We would never have good times if 

 people didn't go in debt. 



"Industry should meet the greater 

 production of agriculture with increased 

 industrial production," he continued. 

 "If the present supply of available 

 money, which can be had at the low- 

 est rates in history, were put to work 

 it would give us a national income far 

 in excess of anything we yet have en- 

 joyed. Monopoly and high prices are 

 responsible for the slowness of pro- 

 duction and unemployment. There is 

 today an abundance of labor and capi- 

 tal. Business men could well survey 

 their needs for the future and expand 

 their plants in preparation for what is 

 to come. Last year they were bidding 

 up and competing both for labor and 

 materials." 



Bold Frontal Attack 



Prof. T. W. Schultz of Iowa State 

 College made a strong case for the 

 slash in industrial tariff, and resump- 

 tion of trade with such countries as 

 Great Britain and Germany. He said 

 that the piece meal tariff reduction 

 involved in Secretary of State Hull's 

 trade agreements with the smaller coun- 

 tries had only scratched the surface; that 

 a bold frontal attack on the abominable 

 high tariff structure of the U. S. would 

 have accomplished far more and 

 aroused less animosity than had the 

 Hull policy of treading slowly and 

 softly. 



Henry Wallace earlier in the day had 

 defended Cordell Hull's trade policies 

 largely on the ground of promoting 

 international good will and breaking 

 the ice for further trade gains later. 



Despite the emphasis given by the 

 newspapers to the cleavage between 

 the New York State Farm Bureau and 

 the rest of the country over surplus 

 control legislation, the difference was 

 never serious and did not approach 

 the point of secession as indicated by 

 the Chicago Tribune. New York dele- 

 gates. King and DuMond, expressed 

 the view that a commodity dollar would 

 solve all the farmers' price problems, 

 yet they failed to explain why with a 

 managed currency corn dropped in two 

 months from |1.43 to 40c a bu., why 

 cotton dropped from 13c to less than 

 8c a lb. and why hogs tobogganed 

 from 12-1 3c down to Tl/^c a lb. 



Delegate Oscar Johnson of Missis- 

 sippi delivered a powerful defense of 

 the crop control program to which 

 the New York delegates objected in 

 the business session Wednesday. He 



AGRICULTURE desires and ia- 

 tenda to be invited into the 

 counsels of the nation. Capital 

 and Labor have held the stage as 

 ii there were no other classes than 

 employer and emploYe, and as ii 

 there were no other issues beyond 

 interest and wages. 



They and the public have alike 

 forgotten that we all eat and that 

 everybody has taken iood for 

 granted long enough. The public 

 sometimes scolds because so much 

 money is devoted to agriculture, but 

 who is getting the principal benefit? 

 Agriculture after all concerns the 

 public as much as it does the farm- 

 er. 



To call a great conierence be- 

 tween employers and employes, be- 

 tween Capital and Labor ii you 

 please, and not call into conierence 

 at the same time the iormers, is to 

 overlook ii not to ignore the iact that 

 the greatest and most iundamental 

 question at issue between the two 

 is food and that the two parties at 

 issue know about aa much about its 

 production as a horse knows about 

 heaven. Employers, employes, con- 

 gressmen and presidents, statesmen 

 and near-statesmen, politicians and 

 publicists — they have all to go to 

 school to the farmer, ior he has 

 something to say to them that is of 

 pressing consequence. — Eugene 

 Davenport at lAA Annual Meeting, 

 Ian. 14, 1920. 



pointed to the fact that New York 

 dairymen consistently had tried to con- 

 trol production and prices and that 

 their New York milk control law had 

 recently been upheld by the Supreme 

 Court. That shot just about stopped 

 the debate, and a moment later in re- 

 sponse to the appeal of Chairman Earl 

 Smith of the Resolutions Committee 

 for harmony, the controversial reso- 

 lution went sailing through with only 

 a few dissenting votes. The gist of 

 the more important resolutions will be 

 found on page 34. 



The convention was well attended, 

 possibly by 1500 to 2000 persons. It 

 generated a lot of enthusiasm through 

 community singing, hog calling and 

 back slapping. The associated women 

 had a splendid program of speakers 

 and events on the preceding Friday 

 and Saturday. McLean and Champaign 

 counties, Illinois, won top honors and 

 prizes in the United States for having 

 the largest memberships. Ford county, 

 111., won the national cup for having 

 the best all-around program of service 

 to members. Illinois led all states in 

 attendance. 



During the meeting Chester Gray, 

 for many years legislative representa- 

 tive of the Federation at Washington, 

 announced his resignation. He has a 

 new job with the National Highway 

 Users Association. — Editor. 



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L A. A. RECORD 



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