FARMERS TO THE FRONT 59 



lessen the power of people in the cities to buy. 

 Smaller stocks in the stores mean a smaller output 

 from the mills and factories, and that means re- 

 duction of wages and of the labor force. So the 

 working man consumes less. So, too, less freight is 

 hauled, earnings and wages fall off in the railroad 

 industry, and consumption again suffers. Thus 

 the farmer is inextricably bound up with all other 

 classes of society. 



Looking at the question, therefore, from the non- 

 farmer point of view, we see that it is one of main- 

 taining and increasing the consuming power of the 

 farmer, which is equivalent to the maintaining and 

 increasing of the general consuming power. And 

 that is a result which all are interested in bringing 

 about. Thus this movement is not for the good of 

 the farmer alone, but for the good of all — the good 

 of the whole country. To regard it in any other 

 way would be singularly to misapprehend it. 



The name of the organization which is now in 

 process of forming, and which will make the Third 

 Power a real power is The American Society of 

 Equity. It is not a farmers' society only, but an 

 American society — that is, for all good Americans 

 who want to see better conditions prevail on the 

 farm. It is not a benefit society, but an equity so- 

 ciety. Benefits are always for an individual or 

 class, while equity is for all. Indeed, it can not be 

 equitable unless it is for all. Equity for one and 

 not for another is not equity, but inequity. It is a 



