Democratic Sentinel, Volume 14, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 February 1890 — MORTGAGE FIGURES IN THE CENSUS. [ARTICLE]

MORTGAGE FIGURES IN THE CENSUS.

Republican* Trying to Fool .the Farmers. Washington telegram: Indignant protests from farmers have been pouring in ever since the Senate summarily recommitted the bill introduced by Mr. Berry, making it the duty of the Superintendent of Census to “ascertain the number of persons who Jive on and cultivate their own f irms and who live in their own homes and the number who hire their farms and homes, and the number of farms and homes which are under mortgage, the amount of mortgage debt, and the value of the property mortgaged,” and providing that “he shall al.-o ascertain the objects for which mortgaged farms and homes have been mortgaged and the rate of interest paid upon mortgage loans.’’ Many of these protests have come from Maine, where the stones are said to be so thick that animals cannot graze until their noses have been sharpened. The noises of the hardy husbandmen themselves have also been kept on the grindstone by the men who hold mortgages on the bleak and barren farms of the Pine Tree State, and they object to the shabby treatment accorded them by the Senate. Mr. Hale knows well enough that the millionaire society of which he is a member does not care to increase the present i outcry against tarid and trust robbery by ordering the collection of statistics showing the enormous burdens which are crushing the former out of existence, but. in order to pacifv his constituents he has introduced a bill similar to Mr, Berry’s, and appropriating $1,000,000 to carry out its purpose. The Senate can attend to that bill in about two minutes.