CHAPTER VIII. 

 AGRARIAN POLITICS. 



THE Agricultural Club, like the body from whence it sprang, 

 represented a passing phase in the agricultural policy of the 

 country. The policy of which it was indirectly the off- 

 spring was devised for the purposes of the war. But if it 

 was born and baptised in war it was confirmed, with a fine 

 display of parental enthusiasm and with all possible pledges 

 for its future guardianship, in peace. Its infant career 

 was, however, terminated by the abhorred shears, or, in 

 the jargon of the moment, the " Economy Axe." 



It must be remembered, therefore, that the discussion of 

 agricultural policy at the Club took place during the brief 

 period when it was assumed that an agricultural policy on 

 novel but quite definite lines had been deliberately adopted 

 and would be continued at least until it was repudiated by 

 the country at a general election. This professedly settled 

 policy was based on three main principles : (a) Guaranteed 

 prices for corn ; (b) minimum wages for labour ; (c) control 

 of cultivation. It represented the most important change 

 in the relation of the State to Agriculture since the Repeal 

 of the Corn Laws. The adoption of this policy was deliber- 

 ate ; its abandonment in 1921 was perhaps one of the most 

 remarkable Parliamentary events in constitutional history. 

 The policy was abandoned because the prices of corn had 

 been miscalculated. To abandon a policy rather than 

 amend an Act was a proceeding which may fairly be 

 described as unusual. 



In October, 1918, i.e., just before the Armistice, when the 

 Corn Production Act of 1917 was in operation, being 

 expressly limited to five years, and before any question had 

 seriously arisen of making it the basis of permanent legisla- 



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