The Habit of Political Graft 
What, i.s known as the Lockwood committee, acting 
for the New York Legislature, lias been investigat¬ 
ing building conditions in New York. They are ex¬ 
posing a system of graft, extortion and crime which 
is almost unbelievable. While New York is making 
and trying to enforce laws to help the housing situa¬ 
tion, builders, dealers and labor men were conspir¬ 
ing to make building next, to impossible on this 
island. In one typical case it was shown how the 
city paid large sums of money to dig out the pro¬ 
posed cellar for a new building. Under the contract 
this cellar had to be “broom clean.” Then the city 
paid to dump refuse info this excavation. It then 
paid more money to have this dug out.—and the hole 
is once more filled with rubbish! All this seems to 
have been done to make political jobs for contractors. 
It is also shown that the trade in building materials, 
from brick to lime, is monopolized and tied up so as 
to protect dealers and middlemen. It has been 
shown that labor leaders and “go-betweens” have 
been holding up builders and contractors like com¬ 
mon highwaymen. The whole thing is sickening. 
This great city is being robbed by a gang of thieves 
aided by politicians who control the offices—most 
of them elected by the people because they hap¬ 
pened- to be on the party ticket. In a smaller way 
much the same thing is being done in other cities 
and towns, and in practically every county of the 
State. Here the rascals are able to do business in 
millions. In the rural county the thieving may not 
rise above hundreds, but the principle is much the 
same. There have been in years past many of these 
exposures. As a result the people have risen in their 
wrath and voted the rascals out, and a group of sup¬ 
posedly honest men in. Then the people went back 
to their pleasure or their business and let the new 
officers alone. Some of them looked the situation 
over and found that the trouble is a public moral 
disease. It has been going on for years and cannot 
be fully removed for years. So they play to the 
“popular” bide, roar at a few minor abuses, wink at 
the big ones, and pull wires for re-election while the 
graft goes on. Then again, sometimes really honest 
men are put in power. They see the trouble. Tt. is 
fundamentally based on the prejudices, laziness and 
moral cowardice of the people. These men strike 
straight at the root of the evil and expose it. Of 
course they cannot cure the trouble in one short term 
of office. They can hardly show that they have made 
a beginning. When they come up for re-election 
every deviltry of political power is turned against 
them. The old argument of party regularity, the 
religious question, the temperance argument, every 
device of Satan is employed to shift the issue away 
from the real one of true reform, and the men who 
try honestly to help the public are swept out of 
office. That has happened so many times that it 
seems to have become a habit. It, is one of the 
national habits that must be broken if this country 
is to endure, and it is one of the things which our 
farmers and country people must help to break. 
The Child Without Milk has no Chance 
Put good milk up in medicine bottles and offer it 
at .$1 a bottle as a food and tonic for weak children. 
Take the known facts about it, and let some expert 
advertiser put. them into forcible language, and the 
milk would sell at its price. One reason why its sale 
is .not Increased is because no one has put its real 
story right into the language of the common people 
of the city. The National Dairy Council tells how 
Dr. Emerson carried out in Chicago an experiment 
which we have often suggested. He went into the 
Chicago schools ami selected several dozen hoys and 
girls who were “below normal.” That means that 
these children were stunted and feeble, with imper¬ 
fect hones and poor general development. No, they 
were not all* “tenement children.” Their parents 
were well-to-do. In some cases they represented 
“the only child.” They wore fairly well-born, but 
had not been properly nourished. They were each 
given at least one quart of milk a day. They ‘'came 
back” at once. One hoy weighed only SO lbs. when 
he should have weighed 131. In 1.” weeks he reached 
bis normal weight. In all cases six lo eight weeks of 
milk feeding gave astonishing results. We know 
such results are sure from our own experience with 
city children. We have had them eoine to the farm, 
pale, irritable, puny and stunted. After a month of 
milk-drinking they became rosy and bard, mill start¬ 
ed to burst their clothing with growth. Milk is the 
most wonderful food a child can have. Thousands of 
city children, well-bml and well-born, to say nothing 
of the tenement children, have been dwarfed in body 
and mind through a laek of lime and vitumincs in 
their food. Milk will supply the need and promptly 
start them growing. The big dairy problem today 
•Pit RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
is how to make these city parents substitute milk 
for “soft drinks.” 
December Milk Prices 
'I he Dairymen’s League has made the price of 
milk for December $3.18 a hundred pounds, with 
the usual freight and fat differentials. The price is 
17 cents a hundred, or one cent a quart, below the 
November price. The price last December was $3.88. 
Usually there has been an advance for December 
over the November price, but in announcing the 
December price the League statement says that “the 
reduction is fhe result of the farmers’ desire to put 
the price of milk on a pre-war basis.” 
It is also announced that the League has pur¬ 
chased a small plant at Newark, New Jersey, to 
wholesale milk, and that C. A. Weiant, who was at 
one time president of Borden’s Farm Products Com¬ 
pany, has been engaged to manage the plant. Mar¬ 
ket conditions have improved of late to some extent 
and the feeling for a steadying market is better than 
it was a month ago. 
The Next Secretary of Agriculture 
Naturally there is great interest, in the selection 
of Senator Harding’s Cabinet. We hear all sorts of 
suggestions regarding the new Secretary of Agricul¬ 
ture. Some demand what they call “a dirt farmer” 
—meaning one who has worked a farm himself, and 
ought to have real sympathy for agriculture. Others 
say they want a great organizer like Herbert 
Hoover, who could put the nation’s business of 
fanning on a par with all other industries. Be¬ 
tween these two extremes there are many other 
suggestions. Our own opinion is that Mr. Harding 
should he left alone to make his own selection. 
Members of the Cabinet are not elected. They are 
supposed to be personal advisers of the President. 
If that i.s true we think the President, in order to 
assume responsibility for his administration, should 
make his own selection without interference or 
dictation. If we were in Mr. Harding’s place we 
should select as far as possible, personal friends 
in whom we had confidence, and who were compet¬ 
ent. to till the positions. We should not try to play 
politics by appointing men from various sections, 
or because they represented various “wings of the 
party.” We should tell the people frankly that we 
regarded the Cabinet as a body of confidential ad¬ 
visers, and that we selected men of our own choice 
because we assumed responsibility and would not 
have such responsibility divided. We think we 
know who is selected for Secretary of Agriculture or 
who will decide the final appointment. He will he 
e'ther a big man, without much practical knowledge 
uf farming, to make large plans, or a practical man 
to give sensible advice. Next, to the Secretary of 
Agriculture we are interested in the new Attorney 
General. Is there any great lawyer in the country 
big and brave enough to really fight the profiteers? 
Annual Session of National Grange 
The fifty-fourth annual session of the National Grange 
at Boston, which closed Friday, November 1!), was nota¬ 
ble for the thoughtful consideration given to many public 
questions, and the long series of resolutions passed. The 
session was very largely attended, and 10,000 members 
were given the seventh degree. Tt was voted to hold the 
sessions for 1021. in Oregon. An invitation to go to 
Kansas was withdrawn, with the understanding that 
the Orange would probably hob! its 1922 meeting there. 
Maine asked for the convention in 1023. 
State Master Ketchem of Michigan, who has been 
elected a member of Congress, made a farewell report 
in which he stated that Michigan had a $12,000,000 
Grange life insurance company. Sherman .T. Lowell of 
Fredonia, N. Y., Master of the National Grange, de¬ 
livered an annual address of more than usual force, one 
■ if the most important paragraphs being this: 
“We feel that, the Grange should still be liberal, and 
notify all interests that we are willing to sir down and 
have a fair understanding of values; the farmer receiv¬ 
ing the same pay for the same hours’ work as others 
receive* no more, no less, but this is the last call. If no 
attention is paid to this by bankers, manufacturers, 
railroad and labor organizations, and the government* 
continues to use its great power to import raw material 
free of duty to reduce costs, as a possible expedient the 
Grange will be forced to join other organizations in the 
movement to organise nation-wide selling organizations 
which will lix the price of foods. There is no threat in 
Ibis. We will have been driven to it to preserve our 
agriculture.” 
Reports showed 382 new Granges formed during the 
year, and 2!> reorganized Granges Leslie It. Smith of 
Massachusetts was elected a member of the executive 
committee for three years, to .succeed William N. Gady, 
whose term of office had expired. 
National Master Sherman J. Lowell was ebs-ted- a 
member of the hoard of managers uf the National 
Grange Monthly to succeed Oliver Wilson of Illinois. 
1831 
For the first, time at a National Grange session motion 
pictures were taken of important events. A private 
showing for the Grange and ite friends of these pictures 
was given at Tremont Temple. Among the most nota¬ 
ble resolutions was one concerning the government in 
business, which reads in part as follows: 
Believing firmly in the principle of more business in 
government, and less government in business, the Na¬ 
tional Grange opposes the continuance or rehabilitation 
ol any of the devices by which the government entered 
into either the actual practice of or the control of busi¬ 
ness as war-time emergency measures, and asks the re¬ 
peal of any and all laws having this as their object..” 
Other resolutions of importance may be summarized 
as follows: 
Asking for laws to prohibit gambling in wheat and to 
strengthen the Land Bank system. 
Endorsing the Thrift and Savings Stamp system. 
Opposing daylight saving. 
Opposing all reclamation projects that will not stand 
mi their own merits, and especially opposing the whole¬ 
sale appropriation of tax-raised funds for wholesale 
reclamation projects. 
Favoring the government manufacture of fertilizers. 
To compel manufacturers to label woolen or part 
woolen fabrics honestly. 
Authorizing the naming of a strong committee to dis¬ 
cuss agriculture with President-elect Harding. 
Declaring that tariff laws must be equitabie towards 
all industries, giving the same protection to agriculture 
that is given to other lines of business. 
Demanding that legislation be enacted to prevent cor¬ 
porations from monopolizing the water power facilities 
of fho nation and (‘harming excessive rates. 
Favoring the leasing of. national resources for the 
benefit of co-operative bodies in preference to private 
corporations. 
Opposing the Nolan bill (the 1 per cent land tax and 
all single tax proposals). 
Asking for a change in the Federal tax on telephone 
rates. 
Opnosing the closed shop. 
Affirming the right to collective bargaining. 
The resolution concerning the telephone is of special 
interest to farmers in the more remote sections It 
roads: 
“A resolution asking for a change in the Federal tax 
on telephone rates from the present unjust and excessive 
tax of 5c on each message costing between 15c and 50c 
to either a lower rate or a sliding scale on those rates ” 
U was stated in the discussion that this tax falls almost 
exclusively on the rural telephone users, and was con¬ 
sidered entirely excessive and very unjust. 
A large amount of time was given to a discussion of 
cn exhaustive and comprehensive analysis of the taxa- 
Lon system and its effects on agriculture, presented by 
T. G. Atkeson, Washington representative of the Grange. 
I his report was printed complete and submitted to th.* 
members. After a long discussion most of the resolu¬ 
tions were adopted, as follows: 
“Since taxation is necessary for the enforcement of 
laws for the protection of property, individual or cor¬ 
porate. therefore no property, either real or personal 
winch i.s protected by law should be exemnt from taxa- 
t’on except such property as may be specifically exempt 
by State constitutions. 
“In order to secure equality in the distribution of the 
burdens of government, if personal property is to be ex¬ 
empt from taxation on account of the indebtedness of 
the owner thereof, then real estate should be entitled 
to the same exemption. 
“Tn the ease of mortgages, by far tlie wisest system is 
to tax the mortgagee on the amount of the mortgage 
nd the mortgagor on the value of the property minus 
the mortgage, the mortgage to be considered as real 
estate ami not • as personal property, and taxed in the 
locality where the mortgage property lies. 
‘ All corporation real estate and personal property to 
lie taxed for local purposes at the same value said prop¬ 
erty is taxed when owned by individuals. 
“The local tr.x of railroad prooerty to be levied on a 
valuation equal to the market value of the capital stock 
plus the market, value of the bonded debt, each taxa¬ 
tion unit to receive such part of the tax as the mileage 
of the road in said unit is to the total mileage. 
Every possible precaution should he taken to secure 
equality assessment between individuals and between as¬ 
sessment districts. 
“No city shall be permitted to make a separate as¬ 
sessment, and all property everywhere shall be uniform¬ 
ly assessed at its fair cash value. 
“We favor the enactment of a law that will secure a 
fair and equitable taxation of bank property, whether 
personal or real, upon the basis that, other property is 
taxed. 
“For State and National purposes we favor an ade- 
uuate and equitable system of income and inheritance 
taxes as a source of permanent income. 
“The immense debts caused by the war have necessi¬ 
tated the introduction of many new and in some cases 
very annoying forms of taxation widcli were accented as 
war measures, and which should now be discontinued as 
promotly as possible. 
“All taxes should he levied so as to encourage home- 
owning, and to discourage speculation and tenantry as 
far as sound public policy will permit, by graduated 
land tax and exemption. 
“The Grange opposes a general sales tax because in 
effect it is a consumption tax and adds an unfair burden 
to all purchasers without reference to their ability t« 
bear the added burden. 
“The Grange is opposed to any form of the so-called 
classification of property which would discriminate in 
favor of any class of pronert.v as against any other class 
for the purnoses of taxation.” 
During the session William Bouek, State Master of 
Washington State Grange, was put on trial before tin 
committee on claims and grievances, charged with ac 
tions prejudicial to the interests of the organization 
Manv hours were given over to a recital of the charges 
and to Mr. Bouck’s defense. It was alleged that he had 
used his influence in a political way, and had added to 
the membership many people who were not in any sense 
farmers, having in mind purposes of his own. He was 
found guilty on four of eight complaints, and was repri 
manded by Master S. J. Lowell. Mr. Bouek then made 
an apology. At the concluding session the Volstead ael 
was. iitiiuialifiedly endorsed, and flic election of officers 
National and State, who will enforce it. was called for. 
Passuge of an appronriation of SlOO.OtXkOOO by Con 
gross was asked, to aid the construction of highways the 
next four years; and the National government was 
urged to establish a Department of Public Welfare, with 
a women’s section. e. j. 
