Evening Republican, Volume 22, Number 200, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 August 1919 — THE AMERICAN FARMER. [ARTICLE]

THE AMERICAN FARMER.

There will be a great deal of sympathy with the protests of the farm- ; ers against the attempts to . hold them chiefly responsible for the high j cost of living. There ’can be no doubt that these men have prospered greatly during the last few years, or that they are now prospering. They have received extraordinary prices for their products, yet they have in the main been natural prices. This country has been feeding the world, and it is still under .the necessity of doing so to a very considerable extexit. But prices oi many of the products of the farm would almost certainly have oeen higher if the price had not been established by the- government. When the restriction was removed the price of hogs advanced. Probably the same thing would happen lin the case of wheat. But the farmers have fared well; prices were and are high, sufficiently so to stimulate 'production. But more than good prices are necessary to insure production on a large, scale. There must be a market for what farmer raises and free and uninter--1 rupted access to it. Not only that, I but 'he must be able to get what he buys at prices that are not disproportionate to the prices he receives. Every strike on a railroad or in a factory is a strike against the farmer —as he is (beginning to recognize. In a statement made yesterday, J. R. Howard,’ president of the lowa Farm Bureau Federation, said: The high cost of. living is due to a stagnation in production of manufactured goods and prepared foodstuffs. Every labor strike that shuts down any plant engaged in the preparation of food or the making of clothing, that shuts down a mine or a mill, adds to the high cost of living. The farmer, Mr. Howard very truly says, has not struck, or walked’ out “or otherwise slackened production.” On the contrary, he has increased his efforts, extended his operations to the limit of his physical ability and financial credit, “and to feed the world, believing that the world would fairly and gladly recompense him.” Yet he is criticized 'by many of those whq have slackened production, and by so doing have added to the price of everything that the farmer must (buy. Mr. Howard insists that the high cost of living is due to extravagant profits of middlemen, the failure of the American people to “practice even ordinary economy in public and private life,” and to strikes. And other -representatives of the agricultural interest, testifying before congressional committess, said that the situation next year would be worse than it is now “unless present disturbed conditions resulting from profiteering in ‘goods and wages’ were settled soon.” The farmer, in other words, produces on an enormous scale what other men need, while other men refuse to produce, or produce in limited quantities, what the farmer needs. Strikes during the last few months on the railroads, in the shipping industry, and in clothing factories, have cost the American people hundreds of (millions of dollars. That is an element in the situation that can no longer be ignored. Yet it is proposed to put an embargo on foodstuffs, thus limiting the farmer’s market, while continuing the free export of clothing, manufactured goods and machinery, of which the farmer is a heavy purchaser. It is well to remember that 'this is still predominantly an agricultural country.—lndianapolis "News.