THE STORY OF THE NONPARTISAN LEAGUE 



that this was not 10 per cent, as the new law 

 said, nor 12, as the old law allowed, but 

 between 13 and 14, and clearly illegal. He 

 sued, therefore, taking advantage of the 

 blessed privilege allowed him by the legisla- 

 ture, and recovered in the lower court. 



The money-lender appealed and the supreme 

 court reversed the finding below and gave 

 judgment to the money-lender on this ground: 



Interest on $300 at 12 per cent, is $36, 

 and since the law would allow the bank to 

 deduct this (in advance) the bank could be 

 construed as lending him (Sundahl) this 

 much more ($36) simply because it did not 

 take interest in advance. 



Interest on $36 at 12 per cent, is $4.32; 

 interest on this at 12 per cent, is 52 cents, 

 and interest on 52 cents is 6 cents, and the 

 court sustained the banker in extorting this 

 interest. 



He would also learn with interest, but 

 probably without surprise, that in these con- 

 ditions farm mortgages in North Dakota 

 totaled $310,000,000, and were increasing 

 so rapidly that wise men were uneasy about 

 the figures. And he would have read with 

 especial interest the testimony of Olaf Knutson 

 that under the law reducing interest to 10 

 per cent, he went to his banker with a first 

 mortgage on his farm, and the terms the Banker 

 allowed were 10 per cent, interest and 10 per 



