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American Agriculturist, January 26, 1924 
Editorial Page of the American Agriculturist 
American 
Agriculturist 
Founded 1842 
Henry Morgenthau, Jr . Publisher 
E. R. Eastman . Editor 
Fred W. Ohm . Associate Editor 
Gabrielle Elliot . Household Editor 
Birge Kinne . Advertising Manager 
E. C. Weatherby . Circulation Manager 
CONTRIBUTING STAFF 
Jared Van Wagenen, Jr., H. H. Jones, 
G. T. Hughes, H. E. Babcock. 
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Published Weekly by 
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partments to 
461 Fourth Ave>, New York, N. Y. 
Entered as Second-Class Matter, December 15, 1922, at the Post Office 
at New York, N. Y., under the Act of March 3, 1879. 
Subscription price, payable in advance, $1 a year. Canadian 
and foreign, $2 a year. 
VOL. 113 January 26, 1924 No. 4 
Support the Dairymen’s League 
ROM the 12th to the 28th of February, any 
member of the Dairymen’s League Coopera¬ 
tive may withdraw from his association. WE 
STRONGLY URGE EVERY MEMBER TO 
STAND BY THIS COOPERATIVE ORGAN¬ 
IZATION. 
Let there be no misunderstanding of the atti¬ 
tude of American Agriculturist in this matter. 
We believe that the attitude assumed by some 
that anyone who criticizes a cooperative is its 
enemy is entirely wrong, in fact, unprogressive. 
Cooperatives make mistakes and everybody 
expects mistakes; but lack of frankness in ad¬ 
mitting the errors leads to lack of confidence. 
Farmers own the cooperatives and therefore have 
a right to know the mistakes as well as the suc¬ 
cesses. We will therefore continue to discuss 
errors as we see them as well as to point out the 
good results. But in so doing, we want it under¬ 
stood that we are entirely friendly, entirely sympa¬ 
thetic and always, we hope, constructive. Will 
you then always remember when you see any¬ 
thing in this paper pointing out faults and mistakes 
in the League or any other organization, as we see 
them, that we have just one object in mind — that 
is, to be helpful. 
No matter what faults the League has, no mat¬ 
ter how dissatisfied you may be over the milk 
situation, every dairyman, whether in the pool 
or out, would be much worse off were there no 
organization. The League and the other coopera¬ 
tives are slowly and painfully working out a great 
Idea, the principle that men can work together 
better than separately. A new trail is being- 
blazed, and the way of the pioneer is always 
beset with trials, danger and tribulation. Wrong- 
turnings will be followed that have to be re¬ 
traced, leaving perhaps bloody footsteps in the 
snow. Weary and almost hopeless miles stretch 
on and on until the heart grows faint; but up 
ahead gleams the goal of a little better day in 
farming, making all of the sacrifice more than 
worth while. 
Never has there been, and never will there be 
any millennium in the farm business. It always 
has been and always will be a business of small 
profits and hard work, but as we see it the one 
hope that can make farming of the future more 
tolerable for white men lies in organization. 
If, therefore, anything should happen to the 
League, the largest of these cooperatives, it would 
be a calamity from which farming would not 
recover in many a long year. 
That School Bill 
" V 
T HE article by Assemblyman Witter on the 
opposite page explains better than we can 
why the American Agriculturist believes that 
the proposed Rural School Bill should be passed. 
Mr. Witter proves that the great majority of the 
district schools in his county would have their 
taxes lowered if the bill should become a law. 
The same is true for other counties. He shows 
too that the bill would give rural people a better 
system of local administration and preserve to 
them both the integrity of their district school 
and local control of the same. 
We have been severely criticized because we 
have done our best to put the facts about this 
bill before our people. On the other hand, we 
have received many encouraging- letters thanking 
us for the information. It ought to be plain that 
the most American Agriculturist will get out 
of its support of this bill is kicks and criticism, 
but it is our sincere belief that its passage would 
be of great benefit to rural sections both from 
a financial standpoint and from the standpoint 
of the educational welfare of our boys and girls. 
If we believe this, then none of our friends would 
have any respect for us nor could we respect our¬ 
selves if we did not have the courage to say what 
we think. We feel that much of the honest opposi¬ 
tion of farmers to the bill is based more on hearsay 
and on unjust misrepresentation than it is on the 
r jal facts. Few people have actually read the bill. 
Some of the resolutions that have been passed by 
local farm organizations clearly show in their in¬ 
troductions that those who passed them had 
listened to attacks on the bill instead of actually 
reading the bill itself. 
We have said many times that if this legislation 
is not wanted by a majority of our rural people, it 
certainly ought to be defeated. But in spite of 
the loud noise of the opposition, we are by no 
means sure that the majority are opposed to this 
legislation. We are sure that, if it is not passed 
there are going to be a good many thousand rural 
school taxpayers who will be sorry and a good 
many thousand rural school patrons who have 
missed an opportunity to give their children at 
least a little better educational chance. Don’t 
take our word for it. When it is introduced in 
the Legislature, ask your Assemblyman for a copy, 
read it and then if you don’t like it, see that it is 
defeated. 
Give Us Tax Relief 
N 1922, the ratio of taxation to income for 
farm people was 16.6 per cent, while that for 
the other people was 11.9 per cent. What chance 
has a farmer to cut down his expenses when taxes 
eat up at least one-sixth of his entire income? 
There have been a good many different kinds of 
organizations proposed to help farmers in recent 
years, but it seems to us that all of us must unite 
in some great way for a single purpose—to reduce 
farm taxes. _ 
Do You Want the Bonus? 
E have had a good deal of discussion of late 
as to whether or not the farmers were in 
favor of the soldiers’ bonus. It has been argued 
that the majority of farmers favor the bonus both 
because they think it is right and also because a 
large number of farmers’ sons would benefit from 
it. When we were asked our opinion, we frankly 
admitted that we did not know, and the only way 
to find out is to ask farm folks. 
Therefore, we are going to conduct a little 
investigation. When you have read this, pick up 
a pen or pencil and write in a sentence or so 
whether you are for or against the bonus. And 
while you are at it, won’t you also state briefly 
your views on the Mellon plan of tax reduction. 
One of the things American Agriculturist is 
always trying to do is to make farm opinion count 
where it will do some good. 
Farm Notes 
E have just begun some test work on 
American Agriculturist farm and were 
very much pleased by the way the cows have 
started off. One in particular, a two-year old 
heifer, daughter of “Old Dutch” (Dutchland 
Colantha Sir Inka), starts with the production of 
seventy-one pounds of milk a day testing 4 per 
cent, butterfat. 
Eastman’s Chestnuts 
Q UITE some several moons ago, when "I was a 
small boy, I was deeply impressed with the 
talking ability of an actor in one of the infrequent 
shows which I was allowed to attend. He came 
on the stage and began to tell in a monotonous, 
unvarying tone of voice a story of a jackrabbit. 
He went back some thousand years into the 
history of the antecedents of that jackrabbit and 
after talking in the same high-pitched voice for 
at least ten minutes he had not yet arrived at the 
point where the jackrabbit had been born. 
When the actor began to talk, the stage was full 
of other actors who served as his audience, but as 
he continued on and on and on, he talked all of 
these one by one off of the stage until finally 
they were all gone. He never missed them, but 
continued without break or pause. Then the 
furniture began to move off a piece at a time, until 
there was nothing left but the talker and the chair 
on which he sat. When he got out of this chair to 
emphasize some particular point, it, too, could 
stand it no longer and disappeared into the 
wings. When the curtain came down, the last 
the audience saw of him, he was telling the story 
of the jackrabbit and had evidently only just 
got nicely started. 
Many times since in real life, some of my too 
expressive friends and acquaintances have re¬ 
minded me forcibly of that actor, and to be per¬ 
fectly fair, I must say that not all of the rapid 
fire tongue shooters are among the fair sex! 
I know of no group of men more impatient with 
a long talker and speech maker than the farm 
bureau men. Certain it is that no one can get 
away with a long speech at one of their confer¬ 
ences unless he has something pretty much worth 
while to say. 
K. D. Scott of Warren County, better known 
among his friends as “Scotty,” who is now chief 
of the New York State Sodbusters (county agents) 
tells the following story of the last Extension 
Service banquet held at the New York State 
College of Agriculture: 
“When one of us had the good sense to crawl 
out of the Extension Service banquet gabfest on 
all fours, he performed a dual service. It un¬ 
doubtedly relieved his own feelings and provided 
a much needed relaxation for all of the sufferers 
in the back of Risley Dining Hall. 
“After a period of inattention, a neighbor of 
ours inquired as to the point to which the speaker 
had arrived. He asked, ‘Is the resume of the 
history of extension work nearly completed?' 
Upon hearing that so far we had only gotten as 
far as the boll-weevil experiences, he exclaimed: 
‘Ye gods! The movement has only been running 
ten yeais. Heaven preserve me from the Exten¬ 
sion Service banquet of 1950!’ ” 
Along the same line, one of my Pennsylvania ( 
farmer friends sends me the following. It seems 
that he and another friend had the misfortune to 
be where they had to listen to a “wind-jammer" 
for a straight two hours. The friend fell into a 
half doze, so his partner fetched him a good hearty 
whack on the back to wake him up. Whereupon 
he said: 
“Hit me again. I can still hear him.” 
