Jasper County Democrat, Volume 3, Number 26, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 October 1900 — How the Farmer Has Prospered. [ARTICLE]

How the Farmer Has Prospered.

The republican newspapers and spellbinders for the past four years have continually dinned “prosperity” into the ears of the farmers, and United States Senator Fairbanks, in his speech here last week, told the farmers how prosperous they had become under the beneficient reign of Hanna, McKinley & Co. He told them just as soon as the Man of Destiny was elected how the price of wheat went up (and he might have added that Leiter went down,) how the price of oats went up, the price of corn went up, the price of hogs went up, etc., etc., until the farmer had more prosperity than he had ever known before.! He said nothing about the price of everything the farmer had to buy also going up from 20 to 100 per cent. But, let us take Senator Fairbanks and the republican press (including the Official Apologist) at their word ajjd see how near the truth they are. We have before us the “Red Book” of Ware & Leland, 200210 Rialto Building, Chicago, commission merchants, grain, seeds and provisions. This book is sent out to the trade, that is, the grain dealers of the country, and is of course non-parti-san. We have no doubt but Ware & Leland are supporting McKinley in this campaign and are echoing the Republican lie of the spell-binders to the farmer about grain prices. This same “Red Book” by the way, is sent out by every large commission house in Chicago, once or twice a year, each containing the same identical figures, the only change in the book being in the firm name on the cover. This authority gives the prices of grain and hogs for from eleven to eighteen years back. The latest price given fpr 1900 is March, the book we have being issued in April of this year. As March was the month both Mr. Cleveland and Mr. McKinley took their seats as pres- ' ident we below give the prices of wheat, corn, oats and hogs during that month for the past eight years, and you can then see how much truth there i@ in the prosperity howl as applied to the farmer. The top figures give the lowest price and the lower figures the highest price reached during the month given: —— Four years of Cleveland. Four years of M’Kinley 1893 _1894 1895 j 1896 1897 j 1898 1899 1900 ( Wheat \ 72 * 55 i 51 $‘ 59 £ 69 £ 1 99 66 ~64~ " HEAT - 1 79| 60 62|| 71 90*1 06* 74$ 67 , Corn J 39 f 34 $ 42 f! 28 22f 28* ~33 33g , I Us 37* 46 j 29* 24|, 29J| 36* 38* , Oat* j 28* 29 28* 18* 16 24* 25* 23 A ( 31 31* 30* 20* 17 | 26|| 27| 24* Live Hogs. .j® ?? 4 3 Xj 333 33 ? 3 3 504 60 ( 8 oo o 2o o 30 4 2o 4 2o 4 I<*|4 00 o 5o Taking the highest prices during the month on each we strike the average* and get the following result: ' Average price of wheat under 4 years Cleveland 67* cents. 1 “ “ “ “ “ * “ McKinley 84g “ “ “ corn “ 4 “ Cleveland 38 17-32 “ “ 4 “ McKinley 32 7-32 “ “ ' “ oats “ 4 “ Cleveland 28 5-32 “ “ “ “ “ “ 4 “ McKinley 24 hogs “ 4 “ Cleve’ld $5.83* per cwt. “ “ “ “ “ 4 “ McK’nlys4.49j| “ “ With the single exception of wheat (which rise was due to , famine in India) it will be observed that each of the above products averaged considerably higher under the four years of Cleveland than under the four years of McKinley. We would also add that the same authority gives the price of corn in Chicago in August, 1894, at 59* cents, and in August, 1895, at 44* cents. The highest price ever attained during the four years of McKinley was in March, 1900, when it reached 38* cents.