DRAG OF THE HARROWS 249 



establishment admitted that it would not mean that 

 necessarily. 



The same question put to C. Rice-Jones, President 

 and Manager of the Alberta Farmers' Co-Operative 

 Elevator Company, brought the same denial. 



" The only men who would be weeded out," said he, 

 " are those who have gone into the local store business 

 without knowing anything about it and who can remain 

 in it only because the present system allows them to 

 charge any price they like. The men who know their 

 business will remain. Those who are objecting to us 

 are objecting to the very thing they have been doing 

 themselves for fifty years organizing." 



"We want to farm, not to go into business," remarked 

 H. W. Wood, President of the United Farmers of 

 Alberta. " The local merchant gives us a local dis- 

 tribution service, a service which has to be given. We 

 cannot destroy one single legitimate interest. But if 

 there are four or five men living by giving a service 

 that one man should give in a community and get just 

 a living that is what we are going to correct and we 

 are absolutely entitled to do so. The selfishness we are 

 accused of the accusers have practiced right along and 

 these very things make it necessary for us to organize 

 for self -protection. If they will co-operate with us to 

 put their business on a legitimate basis we are willing 

 to quit trying to do this business ourselves." 



That is straight talk, surely. It is a challenge to the 

 business men to meet the farmers half way for a better 

 understanding. No problem ever was solved by 

 extremists on either side. Enmity and suspicion must 

 be submerged by sane discussion and mutual con- 

 cessions bring about the beginnings of closer unity. 



