226 



The Dawn of a New Constructive Era 



The Nation's 

 Trend Awaij 

 from the 

 Farm 



The Necessity for Organized 



Effort 



By General L. C. Boyle 



of Kansas City 



Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen : I want to tell you of a 

 thought that has occurred to me while I sat here today listen- 

 ing to this discussion. You talked about sheep, important as it 

 is ; cattle and hogs and grain ; but there is something at the base 

 of all that which is more important than anything else, and that 

 is that this Conference is giving evidence of the right spirit, the 

 unselfish spirit; that is an evidence of devotion at a very logical 

 and critical time in our* nation's history. 



Rural Depop- 

 ulation a 

 Menace to the 

 Nation 



What is this movement we are discussing here? 



It 



IS a 



movement that, at its base, means, Back to the land. My 

 friends, we are 140-odd years old, this nation. Jefferson said we 

 should have a government here devoted to agriculture. He 

 discouraged industry, in our modern sense of great industrial 

 centers ; discouraged the commerce of the seas, and said that we 

 should have a great nation of agriculturists, with small com- 

 munities. That was the ideal social body, according to the 

 vision of that great far-seeing man. For a little while, however, 

 and for years, we were an agricultural body ; but in the last 

 thirty-six years the trend of oscillation has been from the farm 

 to the great cities of the land. Thirty-odd years ago 70 per cent 

 of our people lived on the land or in rural communities. Today 

 over 50 per cent of our people live within city walls. From a 

 producing, we are becoming a consuming nation. From a rural 

 we become an urban social order. 



The history of the peoples of the past, as written, teaches 

 their love of the land and their loyalty to the land ; and just in 

 proportion as they left the land for the cities, in that proportion 

 can you read the downfalls of the nations of the past. The ob- 

 servers and thinkers of modern life here in America recognize 

 a menace to the national life in the growth of our great cities 

 and the depopulation of our rural communities. Do you know 



