FARMERS TO THE FRONT 145 



through local companies or through one central 

 company, the farmers certainly ought to carry their 

 own fire insurance. It is the same with life insur- 

 ance. This insurance, if limited to the agricultural 

 class, can easily be offered at a lower rate than that 

 charged by companies that take all classes of risks 

 up to the extra-hazardous. And with improved con- 

 ditions on the farm, which it is intended to secure, 

 life will be prolonged, and the farmer will become an 

 even more desirable risk than he is now. This is 

 incidental, and is not involved in the main plan, but 

 it is important as being one of many things which 

 the farmers may, and should, do for themselves. 

 They even might, as has been suggested, in time, be- 

 come their own bankers. 



Viewed in this way the field of the American So- 

 ciety of Equity is almost limitless. It is remarkable 

 how everything that is suggested contributes to sol- 

 idarity. For example, the society will exert its in- 

 fluence to secure the improvement of the highways, 

 toward which something has already been done. 

 The amount of money that the farmers lose each 

 year by bad and impassable roads is almost incalcu- 

 lable. The light loads which they are often com- 

 pelled to haul, the wear on wagons and stock, the 

 often enforced loss of a favorable opportunity to sell 

 through the inability to get to town at all — all this 

 is costly and wasteful. We all realize what the rail- 

 roads have done for the farmer in the way of open- 

 ing up markets, and we know that if the rail- 



