GENERAL FARM PROGRAM 403 



I very definitely think that if we gave a fair support price level the 

 family-sized farms themselves would more than absorb what the 

 national cotton quota should be. 



I do not know that we can totally exempt them. But why can we 

 not approach this from the angle of protecting the family-sized farmer 

 in his allotments, in his quotas, in the amount he can market and the 

 acreage he can plant under the marketing-quota law ? 



We have a provision in the cotton law now that says that a man 

 who has planted 5 acres or more should get a minimum of 5, 



Then there is machinery to build him up to 15. Allien you build 

 him up to 15. the balance of the cotton acreage in that county is allotted 

 on a percentage of tilled soil in the county available for the protection 

 of cotton, 



I think you have a small exemption in the corn-marketing quota law. 

 I believe it is 300 bushels. 



Mr. Talbott. It is very much of a token proposition. 



Mr. Pace. There is one in the wheat law. Would that not be a 

 better approach to the problem ? 



Mr. Talbott. ]Mr. Chairman, I believe that I, and I suspect that 

 the rest of our organization, could agree with you if this unit system 

 could be employed and equal treatment given to all commodities so 

 that when acreage allotments or marketing quotas on certain crops 

 had to be imposed the man would have the opportunity to shift into 

 something else that would pay equally well. 



Mr. Pace. You understand this committee must submit legislation 

 to Congress to change our quota laws — in writing into the act the 

 Secretary must take into account the past acreage, the land available 

 and for cultivation, the topography of the land, and there should be 

 written in there a provision to allot an adequate acreage to assure 

 that the farmer can maintain a proper standard of living on the farm. 



Mr. Pattox. Mr. Chairman, if I may comment, you will recall that 

 when I testified before you on the cotton matter I suggested as a rough 

 figure 25 acres which could be divided between cotton and other cash 

 crops as a minimum. I do not know that 25 acres is the figure. 



Supporting what Mr. Talbott has suggested in relation to the farm 

 plan, it seems to me if you went beyond one cash crop and made a mini- 

 mum below which this man did not have to go and yet gave enough 

 room to shift so that he would have a minimum allotment, that would 

 be better. 



Mr. Pace. I think we will very definitely write in there that in mak- 

 ing the cotton allotment, the Secretary shall take into account the 

 other cash crops to be produced on that farm. 



Mr. Talbott. I think that is a very important point, Mr. Chair- 

 man, f 9r two reasons : First, I am one of a school of thought, and prac- 

 tically all of our people in the Farmers Union subscribe to that school 

 of thought, that there are many things that have to be done besides 

 dealing with price alone to solve the problems for family type farmers. 



I am sure you will agree there are many additional things from what 

 I have heard you say back over the years. 



The second is that regardless of the area, regardless of the crop or 

 crops produced, there is an irreducible minimum below which the 

 multiple of cash crops for sale times even a higher and higher price, 

 below which a family cannot subsist. 



91215 — 49 — ser. r, pt. 3 4 



