24 ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION 



government to do is to pass laws that give agriculture the 

 same opportunity to develop that all other industries have, 

 and that Uncle Sam should see to it that we all play this 

 game square. That is the duty of government. It isn't to 

 market our products, it isnt to save us from our foolishness. 

 I don't want to live in America or any other nation that 

 doesn't permit me to make a fool of myself. We can't save 

 ourselves by trying to lift ourselves with our boot straps. 



The dairy men of this country have been more sensi- 

 ble, Mr. Chairman, allow me to say, down here among the 

 corn and the hog fellows, than any other branch of agri- 

 culture, because we have gone through this period of de- 

 pression better. We haven't got the money we would like 

 to have gotten for our product. We never will. I have 

 never gotten as much out of Hoard's Dairyman as I would 

 like to have gotten, but there is a limit to what the indus- 

 try can pay a man; there is a limit to what the consumer 

 can pay for products. As we view the agricultural situa- 

 tion, the dairy situation, here is what we find: besides the 

 poor cows that I have spoken of, we have neglected to grow 

 legumes for the cattle. 



I make up thousands of feeding rations every year; 

 not hundreds, thousands, and right today they are quoting 

 corn down in Virginia at forty-two dollars a ton. The peo- 

 ple around here would be glad and would make a profit if 

 they could sell their corn at forty-two dollars a ton. Why 

 doesn't the Virginia farmer grow some more corn? He 

 can; also alfalfa hay. With ground alfalfa around thirty- 

 six dollars a ton all the time, he will have to pay thirty dol- 

 lars a ton throughout the south when his land will grow 

 from three to four tons of alfalfa hay per year. 



Out in Iowa not a month ago I made a ration for a 

 man that was feeding corn silage and old oats and not get- 

 ting any returns. It was costing him one dollar a bushel. 

 If butter had been worth a dollar a pound that man couldn't 

 have made any mioney, and if it went to a dollar a pound 

 tell me who is going to buy it outside of the few rich? Was 

 that man's solution to his problem of feeding corn silage 

 and old oats to turn to any better agency than himself? 



