NEW DEAL: FIRST PHASES 49 1 



brunt of the program. Likewise, the plan for taking millions of acres out 

 of cultivation was not accepted as a sound one, because by better and 

 more intensive methods of cultivation of the land being planted, the 

 anticipated effects from acreage curtailment could easily be offset. The 

 question was also raised whether the curtailment program would lead to 

 an increase in the number of unemployed in the rural areas who would 

 of necessity be thrown onto the already overburdened relief agencies. 

 Others felt that the costs of the program were excessive and that the heavy 

 taxes that were being imposed to finance the New Deal would retard 

 recovery. 



One would be uncharitable indeed to deny that the A.A.A. had some- 

 thing constructive to offer, because it did, and along lines that were novel 

 and difficult to measure. It helped make farmers a little more conscious 

 of conditions in other parts of the country and the world; it sought to 

 impress the farmers with the need for keeping farm records, a not insig- 

 nificant effort; it helped increase the amount of land converted to 

 pasturage and soil-building crops; it gave the farmers some additional 

 insight into the intricacies of marketing; and it demonstrated the value 

 of cooperation in the realm of public affairs. 38 



Meanwhile, the county agents, who had played such a big role in 

 carrying out the provisions of the A.A.A., were being subjected to a 

 barrage of criticism. Such protests came not merely from farm groups 

 who in later years contemptuously referred to this alignment as the 

 "Farm Bureau-Extension Axis," but from others as well who opposed 

 the multiple activities that the agents engaged in. Very early in the New 

 Deal program, one caustic critic observed: 



The county agent, created for a good and laudable purpose, has been re- 

 vamped into a tool for politicians. His original duties have been forgotten and 

 today, in addition to being the local representative of political machines, he is 

 in many instances the active competitor of the local elevator, the retail feed 

 dealer, the retail coal merchant and practically every other merchant and enter- 

 prise in the community. He is the advance guard of every type of farm relief 

 measure and an educator has been turned into that of a rural ward-healer 

 [sic]. . . . 



38. Weekly Kansas City Star, May 15, 1934. 



39. Co-operative Manager and Farmer (Minneapolis), XXII (April, 1933), p. II. 

 For an added attack against the county agent system, see ibid., pp. 14-15. 



