102 



DRY-FARMING CONGRESS, WICHITA, 1914 



The possibility of making character a basis for credit is of peculiar 

 and vital importance to our agricultural development. The men upon 

 whom we must depend for the future expansion of our agricultural pro- 

 duction haven't much else. The well-to-do farmer, who has already ac- 

 cumulated a considerable fund of property, is not the farmer who is 

 likely to clear and reclaim new land, and bring under cultivation the vast 

 area of tillable land both East and West, North and South, which is still 

 untilled. This gigantic task will be performed, if at all, by young men 

 who have little except their hands and their pluck and determination. 

 Such were the men who reclaimed and subjugated the lands now tilled, 

 and such will be the men who reclaim and subjugate the lands still untilled. 

 Such were the men who built the rural homes in which the best of our 

 present population was nurtured, and such will be the men who build the 

 rural homes in which the best of our future population will be nurtured. 

 It is through such men that our financial interests must work if they are 

 to be of the greatest use to the agriculture and the rural civilization of 

 the future. 



The farmer who is to cultivate the present untilled area has one 

 problem to face which did not worry the pioneer farmer of the past, 

 though the pioneer farmer had a good many which the farmer of the 

 future will not have; that is, the problem of supplying himself with capital. 

 Most of the land upon which a farmer could begin growing crops without 

 a considerable preliminary expenditure of capital, has already been brought 

 under cultivation. That which remains requires such an investment as 

 pretty generally to exclude the homeseeker who has nothing but his own 

 labor to invest. Unless some method can be found which will enable 

 him to supply himself with the necessary capital, farming will cease to 

 be an opportunity for the homeseeker in America. 



So generally is this fact understood that some students of the problem 

 have concluded that the day of the small farmer is ended, and that here- 

 after we must depend upon the large capitalist farmer or the farming 

 corporation. That would be a pity. Where the two have equal oppor- 

 tunities, the small or middle-sized farmer has always beaten the big 

 farmer and the farming corporation in competition. There are only two 

 conditions under which the big capitalistic farmer has won out. The first 

 is where he has had a large supply of cheap labor, such as slaves, or 

 gangs of coolie laborers, which he could direct and control. The independ- 

 ent small farmer who works with his own hands has then found himself com- 

 pelled to compete with those cheap laborers, and he has had a "hard row 

 to hoe." The other condition is where the big farmer, or the farming 

 corporation has had some advantage in bargaining over the small farmer. 

 If he can buy his supplies to better advantage, if he can secure capital 

 on more favorable terms; if he can sell his produce to better advantage, 

 he may succeed in competition with the small farmer. But when it comes 

 to the real work of production, as distinct from bargaining — that is, as 

 distinct from hiring labor, borrowing capital, buying supplies, or selling 

 produce — the small farmer can beat him and eventually run him out of 



