638 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



works up to 10. As the latter rate is above the legal it 

 limit in most states, it will be to the profit of the banks 

 to get in their notes as soon as possible. They will be 

 taxed at the rate of 10 per cent at the end of six months. 



The national bank group formed in Chicago has the 

 privilege of adding $46,000,000 to the volume of our cir- 

 culating medium. Every city has a relative power. The 

 New York group is considerably larger than that of Chi- 

 cago and could put out in an emergency about $100,000,000. 

 Boston, Philadelphia, St. Louis and other large centers 

 could add many millions more, and groups which are to 

 be formed by the national banks in small cities would 

 play no small part in this general plan to stop money 

 scares and panics. 



This principle of elasticity in the circulating medium 

 is what gives steadiness to the money market in Europe 

 and Canada. As all emergency circulation is to be based 

 on bonds of a high class or the best kind of commercial 

 paper, the soundness of the plan can hardly be questioned. 

 The emergency money is bound to be as good as all other 

 money, which is as sound as the government or the peo- 

 ple who stand back of it. 



has opened the eyes of many men to actions which have 

 become a curse of the association. 



The whole course of such men as Maxwell, Booth, 

 McGee and various officers of the reclamation service has 

 tended to bring the irrigation movement into disrepute. 

 They will be eliminated in time, as a matter of course, 

 and the sooner the better. 



Strong and voluntary indorsements of 

 Indorsement our editorials denouncing irrigation con- 

 of Editorials vention politics are coming to us from all 

 Exposing parts of the country, showing that pub- 



Ring Tactics lie sentiment has been awakened to the 

 damage being wrought by ring tactics. 

 The real irrigation people are in this movement as a 

 business proposition and for the good of the country. 

 Why their efforts should be hampered by the maneuvers 

 of a gang of petty politicians they can't understand. 



There is one fact, however, which explains the situa- 

 tion. In every movement of a public or semi-public char- 

 acter there will be found a lot of disappointed politicians 

 who are seeking places of honor and profit. No secret 

 order is without them. A county or stale fair can't be 

 run without having their pestiferous presence as a hamper. 

 Even the church is annoyed and injured by them. The 

 irrigation movement has been of such a popular nature 

 as to attract a swarm of these place hunters, who have 

 the disposition to sacrifice the best interests of the public 

 if they can only gain for themselves elective or appointive 

 places which will bring their names into print occasion- 

 ally. 



It would seem as if a convention called for the pur- 

 pose of advancing the cause of agriculture and pushing 

 the principle of irrigation might be free from politics, but 

 this is not to be just yet, judging by disclosures of recent 

 years. The real irrigation people are tired of these little 

 fellows who seek the limelight and places of influence for 

 themselves, and it is to be hoped that the turning point 

 has come, as we might almost declare it had after read- 

 ing numerous letters approving IRRIGATION AGE'S remarks 

 on the subject last month. 



The brazen action of Pinchot and Heney in boosting 

 B. A. Fowler into the presidency in place of Col. R. E. 

 Twitchell was an example of the petty politics of which 

 people are complaining. The framing up of a job to give 

 the secretary $3,000 a year is another illustration. This 

 scheme to supply one individual with a sinecure is pretty 

 expensive and may be one of the final straws in breaking 

 the camel's back. In other words, it is so rank a deal that 



One of the best results gained from irri- 

 Good gation is good farming. People who buy 



Farming irrigated land usually take small tracts 



Is One Result and proceed to work them on the in- 

 of Irrigation tensive principle. The aim is to make 

 the soil do its best. Therefore the most 

 intelligent and successful farming in America today, out- 

 side of experimental stations, is in the irrigated sections. 



The tendency of every person owning a farm of ten 

 to forty acres is to do thorough work, and accomplish 

 through this means as much as is gained ordinarily on 

 one hundred or one hundred and sixty acres. A majority 

 of those buying these small farms are practical men who 

 desire in the first place to get land of their own, and sec- 

 ondly to have an opportunity to conduct a farm on pro- 

 gressive lines. The thousands of tenant farmers in the 

 older sections of the country are not able to get land 

 where they are at any figure within their means, as own- 

 ers usually hold their property in large tracts, believing 

 that ultimately it will be most profitable in such shape. 

 These people can buy the little farms in irrigated sections 

 and win success on them. 



Tenant farming is a sort of bondage that is hard to 

 break, but while it is increasing in the older states, where 

 retired farmers or capitalists hold their land in large 

 blocks, there is a keen desire on the part of nearly all 

 who operate rented places to possess land and dwellings 

 of their own. How farm tenantry is increasing in the 

 United States is shown by the following table: 



1880. 1890. 1900. 



Owners 74.5% 71.6% 64.7% 



Tenants 25.5% 28.4% 35.3% 



This is a grave situation, and no movement is more 

 deserving of encouragement than one that aims to free 

 men from it. The free man is the man who controls the 

 sources of his own support. The tenant must take the 

 most overworked and impoverished land and raise the 

 least profitable crops. He has no fixed place of abode. 

 His annual rent is a perpetual debt and himself and family 

 are mere driftwood. He shares but little in the general 

 prosperity. All times to him are hard times. The most 

 important step in national progress is the effort to pro- 

 vide homes for the men who desire to be independent 

 and own the land they live on. 



The director of the United States Reclamation Serv- 

 ice, F. H. Newell, says: "The West is developing rap- 

 idly. We are putting good substantial settlers on forty- 

 acre tracts. They are men of large families. This dense 

 population means much for the country and for the set- 

 tler." 



But the director adds a word of caution: "The irri- 

 gated countries are no place for the poor farmer. The 

 man who goes there must use his brains in all his farming." 



The little farm is for the progressive man, whether 

 he buys it outright or takes it under the Reclamation 

 Act. Wherever the up-to-date farmer acquires one of 

 these little tracts in the irrigated section of the West 

 we can depend on seeing good results. 



