v n 1 T Ywril Published Weekly by Tlie Rural Publishing Co., 
' A11 ‘ 333 W. 30th St.. New York. Price One Dollar a Year. 
NEW YORK, MARCH 22, 1919, 
Entered as Second-Class Matter. .Tune 26. 1879. at the Post 
Ofiice at New York. N. Y„ under the Act of March 3. 1879. 
No. 4526 
Big Questions For American Farmers 
We Must Get Together to Meet Them 
Part I. 
S OME RECENT ARTICLES.—T have just read 
the February 22 issue of The R. N.-Y"., and it 
contains so many interesting things that I cannot 
help commenting on 
them. The article by 
IV. F. O'Connor and 
the comments by the 
editor on same are 
both splendid. The 
editorial on the same 
subject on page 320 
is excellent. The ar- 
ticle by A. R. Kohler 
on page 321 deserves 
. careful thought. The 
“Up - State F a r m 
Notes” on the same 
page are also excel¬ 
lent. It is these ar¬ 
ticles that I wish to 
comment on. Per¬ 
mit me to say, as in¬ 
troduction, that I am 
a farmer first, op¬ 
erating 000 acres of 
land, and that I am 
moderately success¬ 
ful in this work: fur¬ 
ther. that for 15 
years I have been 
general manager of a 
successful business, 
and I think possibly 
m.v working along 
both these lines gives 
me a much broader 
perspective than if I 
worked only with one 
of them. I am not a 
sorehead in any sense 
of the word, and 
while I criticize some 
things very freely, I 
believe that I see the 
good points of the 
other side just as 
easily as anybody 
does. 
THE CITY ATTI¬ 
TUDE.—I believe the 
present situation, 
viewing the country 
as a whole, is fraught 
with unusual difficul¬ 
ties and dangers. It 
would be impossible 
in one or even in sev¬ 
eral brief articles to 
go into detail on all 
these matters, but I 
shall comment just as 
briefly as possible on 
the various matters, 
and thereby try not 
to tax the patience of 
the editors. There must be a cause for every effect, 
and I think a careful study of causes is more valuable 
than a study of the effect itself, but. such a study is 
worthless unless we try to reason out a really prac¬ 
tical lernedy. I am not sore on city people us a class. 
I have many friends in the cities, and most of these 
people are honest, capable, fairly broad-minded folks, 
who do not particularly indulge in effort to injure 
u;: farmers. Most of them, however, are extremely 
ignorant of farm conditions, farm costs, and farm 
profits. This ignorance is taken advantage of by 
practically all of the city press, and I will say with 
practically no qualification that the city press of the 
In the T.nsf Analysis This is the Hope of the Nation. Fig. 123 
nation, that is, the great daily papers, are unquali¬ 
fiedly opposed to anything that is going to benefit the 
farmer. More than that, they are anxious to do any¬ 
thing they possibly can actually to injure him. 
TAXES AND BOYCOTT. —The result of this 
prejudice on the part of the daily papers is not 
always openly felt by us farmers, hut at the present 
time in my own State tliei'e is an open movement 
on hand to classify taxation. This movement will 
undertake to increase taxes on the land and decrease 
it on business. I think the movement,will succeed, 
and I think it is aimed almost entirely to the 
detiinrent of the farmer. All of you are familiar 
with another result 
which is achieved by 
the same source; 
that is, the boycott 
which city people 
from time to time 
place upon food ar¬ 
ticles when the y 
think the price is too 
high. They are prob¬ 
ably honest in think¬ 
ing the prices extor¬ 
tionate. but I have 
never yet seen a boy¬ 
cott on food stuffs 
that was actually 
warranted by condi¬ 
tions. judged from 
the producers’ stand¬ 
point. 
FARM COSTS. — 
At the present mo¬ 
ment city people feel 
that food prices are 
almost beyond reach. 
Some of the city pa¬ 
pers are almost hys¬ 
terical over the mat¬ 
ter. I happen to 
know almost too well 
how , close are the 
m a r g i n s of profit 
even with present 
prices, which are 
high. T am feeding 
200 head of cattle. I 
weigh these every 30 
days, and T weigh the 
feed that they con¬ 
sume. Last month 
their gain cost $15.82 
per hundred pounds, 
without figuring any 
interest on the in¬ 
vestment. any charge 
for use of buildings 
or machinery, any¬ 
thing for labor, bed¬ 
ding. etc., and these 
cattle are not yet to 
their most expensive 
feeding period. The 
last of the feeding 
period I always han¬ 
dle at a loss. About 
half the feed that 
they are consuming T 
produce, the other 
half I bought, hut I 
figure barely market 
prices in either case. 
All that . any o n e 
needs is to reflect for one moment to see that while 
present prices are high, I am not going’to get rich 
out of these cattle, and yet they are fed as eco¬ 
nomically as I know how to do, and I think that I 
am a reasonably successful feeder. 
THE POISON OF PREJUDICE.—If we adopted 
