ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION. 129 



Some Educational Forces that are Helping 

 the Farmer and Dairyman 



A. B. HOSTETTER, SUPT. AND SECY ILLINOIS FARMERS' INSTI- 

 TUTE, SPRINGFIELD. 



Ladies and Gentlemen: Tlirough some mistake, lil^ely the printer'fT, 

 for printers do sometimes make mistakes, I am recorded on tiie program of 

 this association as secretary of the Farmers' Alliance, an organization 

 that is dead, killed several years ago by politics. The program should 

 read, "Illinois Farmers' Institute,'" an organization which was never 30 

 much alive as it is today. 



Since our attention has been called to the Farmers' Alliance, it might 

 be well in passing, to give it a moment's thought. The older members 

 of this audience will remember much about the Farmers' Alliance. Its 

 fundamental principles, object and purposes were good, the membership 

 was large, larger than that of any other farmers' organization ever at- 

 tempted, and the possibilities of its usefulness great and promising, but 

 unscrupulous and ambitious men were permitted to get control of it& 

 offices and to use its membership to further their own selfish political 

 aspirations. The result was the disruption and death of the Farmers* 

 Alliance. 



This ought to teach us to keep our Dairymen's Association, Farm- 

 ers' Institute, Agricultural College, and, in fact, all our educational in- 

 stitutions free from every phaze of partizan politics. 



Every man and every society or class of men is operated upon by 

 two opposing forces. There are influences which tend to build up, 

 strengthen, enlarge, and beautify humanity and the social relations of 

 life, and influences which have the opposite effect, which tear down, 

 weaken, narrow the life and darken human existence. Every man and 

 every woman, whether he or she wills it or not, exerts an influence, be 



