The Dawn of a New Constructive Era 37 



I mig-ht say further that I don't want to appear presump- 

 tuous. I realize that the sort of problems we are working on 

 are in a different part of the country, where climate, topography, 

 soil conditions and producing conditions are very much dif- 

 ferent. The people, it has been my experience, are just about 

 the same all over these United States ; and they are just about 

 equally progressive in one place as another ; and they are equally 

 patriotic, and equally anxious to respond to an appeal such as 

 Mr. Vrooman made here today. 



Moreover, so far as the West is concerned, there is no 

 spirit of adverse competition ; they want you to do the very Sectional 

 best you can here; they want you here in this Southern country Jl^^^ ^ t ^u„ 

 to make the best and most of these resources you have ; we past 

 feel you want us in the West to do likewise, because we know, 

 even from a selfish standpoint, that the more you can raise the 

 more money you can make, and the more people you have making 

 a good living, the more of our product you will be able to buy, 

 and the better we do the more of your products we will be able 

 to buy : the time is long since past when there is any necessity 

 for a spirit of destructive competition as between different parts 

 of this country. I talked to a man in Virginia the other day 

 who is very familiar with the growth and development of that 

 state, and he told me, among other things, that there were 

 thousands of acres of formerly cultivated lands in Virginia that 

 had been permitted to grow to trees, and I said to him, "Why 

 was that?" He said, "After the war of the States there was the 

 great Middle W^est ; and we couldn't compete with the country 

 out there where they had unlimited cheap and fertile lands." 

 Those conditions have passed, as I will attempt to show you. 



Now, speaking in a general way, it would seem to me that 

 one of the first questions that presents itself is whether or not 

 there is anything in this proposition we are talking about ; 

 whether our efforts must result in failure, as regards this tract 

 of seventy million acres now lying idle ; are we dreaming about 

 an impossible thing, or have we a practical problem on which 

 we have a fair chance of success? To me, with the experience 

 I have had in recent years, it seems very strange, it seems 

 almost incomprehensible, to think of seventy million acres of 

 land that will raise anything at all, lying idle, and not being 

 made to produce the most and best it can. 



