Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 182, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 August 1913 — Can’t Fool the Farmer. [ARTICLE]

Can’t Fool the Farmer.

Senator Simmons, in reply to the charge that the pending tariff bill sacrifices the farmer by taking the tariff off all he produces, points to the reductions made in the tariff on agricultural implements. What proportion of the cost of farm production does Senator Simmons imagine the cost of farm machinery constitutes? The cost of machinery and raw materials means much to the manufacturer, but it means very little to the farmer. No one doubts the. immediate competitive effect of free trade in agricultural products. The situation with respect to agricultural machinery is very different. There is no assurance whatever that there will be any reduction at all in the price of the output of agricultural implements as they reach the farmer.

The farmer, at the best, is taking a certain reduction in the price of all he produces in exchange for an uncertain reduction in the price of articles which do not constitute more than ten per cent of his production cost. Senator McCumber is right in his statement that the farmer is the “goat” of the Underwood-Simmons-Wilson bill. Not only will he lose out by reason of the decreased price received for what he produces, but h$ has ahead a prospect of losing the home market which is his nearest and best market. The sophistries of those who stand sponsor for the new tariff bill will not go down with the hard headed American farmer who knows on which side his bread Is buttered. —lndiana State Journal.

There persons were killed, a score or more were seriously injured and thousands’ of dollars’ damage was inflicted on government and private property by two storms of wind, rain and lightning, which joined forces from the northeast and northeast and swept over Washington, D. C., shortly after 3 o’clock yesterday afternoon.