THE COMMUNITY IDEA 155 



communities, especially those containing villages, which 

 should be closely knit with the farming region, and 

 which would be greatly advantaged through the de- 

 velopment of certain local industries. It is not un- 

 thinkable that the labor supply in some regions may be 

 secured through the development of such industries as 

 electric power, employing labor which will be available 

 for the farmers during the summer. Certain small 

 manufactories use up the surplus or otherwise waste 

 products of the neighboring farmers and thus are an 

 advantage to everybody. But these things have to be 

 planned for and, as a rule, this will be done only when 

 the community as a whole takes action. 



Rural Credit. Credit may be made largely a com- 

 munity affair instead of merely an individual matter. 

 Probably the one outstanding fact gathered by the 

 American Commission which went to Europe in 1913 

 to study agricultural credit and cooperation, was ex- 

 pressed by the former Premier of Italy, Luzzatti, when 

 he said: " We have capitalized character." That is, 

 a community of farmers of very moderate means, if 

 they know one another and are willing to back one an- 

 other, can borrow a great deal more money and on far 

 better terms if they act together, than the different in- 

 dividuals in that community can do if each acts alone. 

 There is an irrigated valley in the West in which the 

 farmers own property probably worth ten million dol- 

 lars. Yet each individual is obliged to borrow money 

 on the best terms he can get as an individual. The 

 farmers of this valley are really or may become prac- 

 tically a unit, a corporation. As such, they should be 

 able to borrow strictly in accordance with good busi- 

 ness terms all the money they need for improvements 

 or for making the crops. They can do it only as they 



