306 POWER AND THE PLOW 



lobby their recommendations count for little in the framing 

 of intelligent and just legislation. 



Tractor manufacturers and the farming public must soon 

 insist upon the right of the traction engine to its place on the 

 public highways. Its abolishment would set the country back 

 fifty years in its methods of wheat production, and cause un- 

 told ruin and actual suffering through the shortage of food- 

 stuffs. Why, then, should the owner of such an engine be re- 

 garded in some states as a criminal in the eyes of the law while 

 in pursuit of his daily occupation? Why should the farm 

 tractor, which has created a new era in agriculture, and revo- 

 lutionized the methods of doing countless tasks both on and 

 off the farm, be discriminated against as a public nuisance? 

 Here are questions for engine manufacturers, for farmers, 

 engineers, and the intelligent business public to weigh carefully 

 and act upon. 



The farm tractor solves the problem of our daily bread, 

 and makes possible the utilization of our whole wheat- 

 producing area. Its use is rapidly extending into the regions 

 of smaller farms and more intensive farming. It holds out 

 the promise of greater improvement and greater benefit to 

 humanity in the future than the mechanical power applied to 

 the great industries which have grown so enormously by its 

 use. Until now the use of the tractor has been so limited, 

 and the interests concerned in its manufacture and use so 

 dwarfed by great industrial corporations, that the lack of 

 just consideration from the public at large has been suffered 

 quietly along with a host of other abuses in our social organiza- 

 tion. Now, however, scores of well-established machinery 

 concerns, representing the most intelligent and progressive 

 manufacturing class of the nation, and tens of thousands of 

 engine owners and operators, are directly concerned with the 

 future of the tractor. Indirectly, but no less actually, the 

 whole population of the country, and of our rural districts in 

 particular, is interested in the attitude of publie officials toward 



