Jasper County Democrat, Volume 20, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 May 1917 — THE PEOPLE FIRST [ARTICLE]

THE PEOPLE FIRST

Years ago, when Commodore Vanderbilt was remonstrated with about how he was running his railroads, he said to the reporter who was questioning him, “The public be damned.” He was running his railroads. Since then the railroads have come a long way and can no longer raise their freight rate a cent without someone’s permission, and if they favor one shipper at the expense of another they run against a criminal law that is more drastic than that for stealing horses. In other words, the public may “be damned,” but it will not stay damned if it finds it out. What better hold has a farmer on his land than old Commodore Vanderbilt had on his railroads back in the 80’s? The railroad men had created something new that had not been in existence when they began, and were an absolute necessity to modern civilization, but farm lands existed by the will of God millions of years before the present owners squatted on them. In the old country the ownership having passed into the hands of the descendants of the king’s favorites of long dgo, the tenants have about as firm a hold on the land by their laws as our owners have. The American farmer is up against the same proposition for the future as the railroad men were when the regulation of their properties by the government began. As long as they are kept contented and well fed the public will let them “damn” it to their hearts’ content, but let the farmers fail in their duty and function and there is no telling what the public may do to them. No doubt the first and popular move would be higher taxes to compel the larger owners to sell the land they could not thoroughly cultivate. We keep hearing of these farmers who object to this agitation for bigger crops. “Just a scheme to let the city people live cheap,” one man expresses it, forgetting that the American farmer must not only feed America but millions of the people of Europe; that he does not own his farm, even though he has a warranty deed and no mortgage; this is a protection only against some other individual taking it away from him, ' for the government which can deprive him of his very life in defense of the common good, can commandeer his property, and compel any man to do its bidding; therefore if farmers imitate old Commodore Vanderbilt and tell the public "to be damned” some day they will pay the price.