98 RURAL SOCIOLOGY 



with the character and condition of that portion of our popula- 

 tion that shall live upon the land. 



I say that the public is more interested than the farmer in 

 these matters because "The Farmer" is actually a collection of 

 individuals who can for the most part extricate themselves from 

 any intolerable situation that may develop ; while the country 

 as a whole cannot extricate itself from the consequences of bad 

 agricultural policies that easily develop when matters of funda- 

 mental character intimately connected with food production, 

 home-building, and land ownership are left to shift for them- 

 selves. 



But we are not without a start in the right direction. More 

 than half a century ago we began to think nationally about 

 agriculture. The impulse had its origin in our consular service 

 and in the primitive collecting instinct whereby seeds and roots 

 of promising foreign plants were sent to America for trial. Out 

 of this grew the Department of Agriculture, representing the 

 official determination of America to do whatever could be done 

 administratively to promote agricultural welfare at home and 

 marketing facilities abroad. 



Again, in the darkest days of our Civil War the United States 

 established the most unique educational s} 7 stem which the world 

 has ever known ; hence this association and the colleges it repre- 

 sents. Aiming at increased production though it does, and 

 national in scope though it is, yet after all, the basis of the system 

 is the education and the initiative of the individual, for it is 

 founded upon instruction of collegiate grade and based upon 

 scientific investigation of the highest order. We could not have 

 a better foundation for 'the edifice that shall one day stand as 

 emblematical of our national aims and purposes in agriculture 

 than is the education system represented l by this Association 

 of American Agricultural Colleges, and there could be no better 

 corner-stone for the structure than the work of the experiment 

 stations connected therewith. 



But this is only a beginning of a national policy for agri- 

 culture ; there yet exists a wide gulf between what these public 

 agencies are doing or can do and what the individual is accom- 

 plishing or able to accomplish under anything like present or 

 prospective conditions. If agriculture is to figure as it must 



