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L A. A. RECORD— October, 1933 



Earl Smith Talks At 



V : Southern ill. Meetings 



Approximately 1200 Farm Bureau 

 members, business men, and their 

 guests from Wabash, Edwards, White, 

 and Wayne counties attended a rous- 

 ing meeting in the High School Gym 

 at Grayville the night of Sept. 19 re- 

 ports L. F. Brissenden, district or- 

 ganization manager. 



President Earl C. Smith was the 

 principal speaker. 



The Williams Colored Quartet from 

 Carrier Mills were enthusiastically 

 applauded when they sang negro spir- 

 ituals and folk songs. 



About 800 attended a similar meet- 

 ing in the afternoon of the same day 

 at the Fair Grounds in Marion, Wil- 

 liamson county where Mr. Smith also 

 was the pHncipal speaker. 



The colored quartet from Carrier 

 Mills provided entertainment at Ma- 

 rion too, under the auspices of the 

 Saline County Farm Bureau which 

 led with 39 new members signed by 

 quota men since Jan. 1. 



At Grayville, the Mercury-Independ- 

 ent published a special edition ad- 

 vertising the meeting and welcoming 

 farmers from the four counties, to 

 Grayville. Local merchants joined in 

 the welcome with paid advertising. 

 The meeting was sponsored by the 

 Farm Bureaus from Wabash, Edwards 

 and White counties, and by the Wa- 

 bash Valley Service Co. 



It's Time to Mobilize 



(Continued from page 5) 



zation campaign. It provides for a 

 state campaign committee with Earl 

 Smith as chairman. The state chair- 

 man will select county organization 

 captains on recommendation of the 

 county presidents. The county captain 

 will select lieutenants so there will be 

 at least one for every township or 

 community in the county. The mo- 

 bilization campaign will be directed 

 toward obtaining new members and 

 bringing present members into good 

 standing. 



Each county under the agreement 

 shall appoint a county organization 

 committee if one is not already in 

 existence to work with the campaign 

 captain and his heutenants. 



The I. A. A. will furnish publicity 

 which the local counties many sup- 

 plement, and has retained Mr. Lucius 

 Wilson, a trained sales and organiza- 

 tion director, for a period of six weeks 

 to take charge of the state-wide cam- 

 paign. He will address county and 

 district meetings of organization work- 

 ers, and direct the movement all along 

 the line. 



"McDonough county is ready to go 



along and put the job over," saiu Fred 

 Herndon, president of the Farm Bu- 

 reau who was first to respond to an 

 invitation by President Smith for com- 

 ment from the floor. 



*'I am authorized by our board t<: 

 pledge the co-operation of Pul«-k. 

 Alexander county," said Presiu at 

 Lingenf elter. 



"We'll do our best to make this a 

 success in Mason county," responded 

 President Chas. Borgelt. 



"We're going to put it over in our 

 county," said President Williams of 

 Champaign county. 



"We've needed this for a long time," 

 asserted an official of the Will Coun- 

 ty Farm Bureau. 



"We're ready to go along in Cook 

 county, all except Chicago," said Dick 

 Nietfelt, president of the Cook Coun- 

 ty Farm Bureau, amidst a burst of 

 applause. 



"It's time to organize more effec- 

 tively. We're ready," said a spokes- 

 man for Vermilion county. 



"During the past two years or more 

 our membership has shown an in- 

 crease every month. We'll be with the 

 I. A. A. 100 per cent in this program 

 to mobilize farm support," said Presi- 

 dent John Miller of Madison county. 



So spoke many others. Finally 

 someone suggested that all in favor 

 rise with their county banners. "This 

 reminds me of Kansas City in 1928 

 and Chicago last fall," commented Mr. 

 Smith as the county banners were 

 waved on high in response to the 

 suggestion. "The sentiment seems to 

 be unanimous. Now I'd like to receive 

 recommendations very soon from every 

 Farm Bureau president for a cam- 

 paign captain for his county. And let 

 nothing but fitness of the man for this 

 particular job influence us in his 

 selection." 



A Call For Action 



(Continued from page 17) 



in farming in that particular area. 

 It was to take care of such experi- 

 enced, capable farmers who stood in 

 danger of losing their farms that the 

 Commissioner's fund of $200,000,000 

 was provided from Federal funds by 

 the Emergency Mortgage Act. This 

 permits the refinancing of farmers 

 deeply in debt without imposing undue 

 risk on the land banks and the farm 

 loan associations. If not more than 

 $5,000 is required from this fund in 

 any one case, a farmer may be re- 

 financed up to 75 per cent of the 

 normal value of his farm and farm 

 property. If normal value has been 

 fairly fixed, creditors of a farmer who 

 owes more than 75 per cent will often 

 find it to their advantage to reduce 

 their claims so that all debts may be 



liquidated by land bank and commis- 

 sioner's loans. ■"'■.. ';'^'-y ■';■^^y^■"^ '.■'-■:*■;:- ■>'• 



, - The Next Few Months V 



We shall have to give an account- 

 ing to the President and to Congress 

 ' what we have accomplished in the 

 administration of this Emergency 

 Farm Mortgage Act. We have an ac- 

 counting to make also to the people 

 of the United States. What we do in 

 the next few months will determine 

 how good an accounting it is to be. 

 Let me summarize my ideas of what we 

 must do to make ours a good report. 



1. We must increase our forces; we 

 must find more efficient methods; we 

 must speed up the work. 



2. We must interpret "normal 

 value" fairly, so that, without making- 

 unsound or excessive loans, we may 

 extend the benefits of refinancing to 

 as many farmers as possible. 



3. We must study every application 

 sympathetically and patiently and 

 strive to find a way to help the ap- 

 plicant out of his difficulties with one 

 or more of the means at our com- 

 mand. 



I congratulate all of you on the op- 

 portunity to render a great service. 

 Let's not muff it. - 



New York City To Care 

 For Its Own Destitute 



Tammany Hall, in control of the 

 administration in New York City, re- 

 cently devised an emergency tax pro- 

 gram to care for their unemployed. 



The program provides an increase 

 of 50% in the water tax, a 5% tax on 

 each taxi ride, a 5% tax on the gross 

 incomes of brokerage houses with a 

 4% share tax on stock transfers, a 

 tax of iy2% on the gross income of 

 all public utility companies and a tax 

 of one quarter of one percent on the 

 value of investments of savings banks 

 and life insurance companies. 



With the city coffers all but en'pty 

 and more than 50% of its total taxes 

 due in 1933 still uncollected, the Tam- 

 m a n y administration was forced 

 either to find new sources of revenue 

 to appease the bankers' demands for 

 a sound credit position or cut down 

 city expenditures sufficiently to bal- 

 ance its budget. 



Unlike the situation in Illinois, 

 Governor Lehmann of New York flat- 

 ly refused proposals of the Tammany 

 leaders to place the burden of unem- 

 ployment relief in New York City on 

 the people of the whole state through 

 state-wide taxation. 



Governor Lehmann told the Tam- 

 many leaders to go home and work 

 out their own tax program in New 

 York City to care for their destitute 

 people. 



