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PAGE SIX
TARMERS’ UNION DEPARTMENT
FARM NOTES.
The largest factor in obtaining and
holding customers is personality.
Farming has become a science, and
needs to be studied from books and
up-to-date papers.
Potatoes should be cut for planting
in good generous pieces, but two eyes
are all that is necessary.
Every farmer should have the fac
ulty of making friends. He should
study human nature and act upon his
judgment and not upon impulse.
Every farmer should be a reader.
He should know what every depart
ment is doing in the world, and the
best methods cf the most successful.
He should read farm and other pa
pers.
Heavy rains are useful. When the
water stands on the ground the high
'and low places may be seen and
the places liable to be washed may
be found.
Farmers should so act that no one
should ever doubt their honesty; they
should so appear that no one would
question the cleanliness of their pro
duce, and should so speak that no one
would doubt their good intentions.
Bean growing is regarded as one
of the most unprofitable crops grown
in the East. The yield is small, and
when the vine with the root is taken
off the field, the soil is greatly im
poverished.—Texas Farmer.
SHALL THE HOME MERCHANT
BE PATRONIZED?
It is stated that two mail order
houses in the city of Chicago did a
business of $80,000,000 last year.
This is another fair sample of mon
opoly swallowing up the business of
the country. This monopoly is fos
tered almost entirely by members and
non-members of trades unions, who
buy their tools from such houses; by
fanners who buy many articles that
they use. Taking for granted, as a
matter of argument, that perhaps at
times, some small sum of money
might be saved on a purchase for
which the farmer or other buyer must
pay before he sees the goods, can any
member of any society or any in fact
in the United States, afford to not
patronize his local merchants?
In the building of any vast busi
ness, whether it be a tobacco tmst,
an oil trust, a beef trust, a railroad
trust, or a merchandise trust, those
who assist in the building of such
vast aggregations of wealth by pat
ronizing it, will find the day when
that power is turned on them, and
they will lose more than they have
gained.
By sending the money away from
home, the person who patronizes the
mail order house impoverishes his
local merchant; prevents his local
merchant from bringing on well-as
sorted stocks or large stocks of mer
chandise; prevents the local merchant
from employing more help, which
usually comes from the ranks of his
patrons; prevents his local merchant
from assisting worthy local enter
prises, either the church, lodge, fac
tory or political movements, that are
nearly always for the benefit of his
local community.
It prevents the growth of popula-
WATSON’S WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN.
tion in the community in which the
patron of the mail order house lives,
and in that way reduces the value of
land, in which the farmer in particu
lar is interested. The greater number
of people in the community, the better
the price of the land.
By patronizing the mail order
houses, the person patronizing such
houses is often deprived of the privi
lege of buying many articles that he
needs immediately that would be of
great benefit to him, and whose cost
could probably be saved many times
over if he could but be supplied at
once.
By refusing and failing to buy from
his local dealer, he loses the oppor
tunity of buying goods that he actu
mail order houses buy seconds and
he could pick out the best and the
cheapest.
It is a well-known fact that mail
order houses get the most of their
business based on low-priced goods,
and when a low price is named, inva
riably, low class goods are furnished.
It is also a well-known fact that
mail order houses buy second and
goods of low quality. As a rule, of
course, they keep some standard goods
that they offer at less than legitimate
profit, which blinds the mail order
house customer and makes him be
lieve that everything the mail order
house offers is good quality and low
in price, w T hich, of course, is not true.
It behooves every person, whether
he be farmer, mechanic, professional
man or capitalist, to buy everything
that he needs from his local merchant
when it is possible to do it; to do ev
erything that he can to encourage the
local trade and local manufacturers.
The sympathy of your own people is
a thing much to be desired and very
much needed.
It is a fact, and can be proven, that
many former successful merchants in
communities that were prosperous
previous to the advent of the mail
order houses, have been bankrupted
and reduced to poverty, and the peo
ple in such communities can get only
the bare necessities, and have to make
frequent trips to nearby towns in or
der to make selections that they for
merly could obtain at home from their
local merchants.
I appeal to all persons to patron
ize their local merchants always, and
to never let the small difference in
price on a few articles stand in the
way of patronizing the local merchant,
for in the communities in which the
farmer, in particular, as well as the
mechanic, professional man, and cap
italist reside, the value of real es
tate will be reduced, and in the items
of butter, eggs, chickens, live stock,
fruits and vegetables, farmer will
lose more by being deprived of a
market for such produce close to
home, for these things that probably
would otherwise go to waste, than any
small difference he might pay his lo
cal merchant or local manufacturer
for their goods, wares or merchan
dise.
Is it consistent to undertake to
fight the trusts with one hand, the
trusts that have reduced the price of
labor and farm produce to such an
extent that your calling is the poor-
est paid in the land, and help the
trusts with the other hand, because
these trusts are willing to sell to you
in some instances at a price slightly
lower than your local merchant can
sell the goods to you for and get a
living profit?—Up-to-date Farming.
GALLANT FIGHT OF THE
COTTON FARMERS.
The Southern cotton farmer, long
the uncomplaining victim of specula
tors, stock-jobbers, market manipula
tors and middlemen, has at last been
thoroughly aroused and is now dem
onstrating to the world his capacity
for taking care of his own interests.
The great number of the farmers, the
absence of business education and
training and the difficulties of secur
ing concerted action have made the
task of welding them into an efficient
organization a difficult one. But as
every great crisis brings forth a lead
er, so the crisis that has come upon
the cotton farmers has developed
leaders among them capable of com
bating the ablest generals ‘on the
other side.
Under this leadership the farmers
have set themselves to the task of
fixing the price they shall receive for
their cotton. The preliminary stages
of this contest have passed and the
last desperate stages have now been
reached. With upwards of two mil
lion farmers welded into 'an organi
zation they fixed fifteen cents as a
minimum price for this year’s crop.
To accomplish this purpose it was
necessary to perfect arrangements
w’hereby money could be borrowed at
a low rate of interest to enable them
to hold their cotton off the market un
til the proper price levels were reach
ed. Ample provision had been made
for these loans and all was going well
until the financial stringency devel
oped, when the farmer suddenly found
himself unable to borrow money and
insistent demand was made for pay
ment of loans already contracted. Un
less relief was promptly found this
would mean the sudden dumping of
the bulk of the crop still remaining
in the hands of the farmer, a break
in prices, and all would be lost.
The resourcefulness of the farm
ers’ leaders in this crisis is what
challenges our admiration at this
time. Many expedients have been re
sorted to and the sum of these will,
we believe, save the farmrs from the
effects of what would otherwise have
been a disastrous rout.
Unable to obtain loans from banks
they have completed arrangements
for large loans from European bank
ers, and soon many thousands of bales
of cotton will go to Europe and there
be held in bonded warehouses until
the farmer desires to sell. While it
would ordinarily be more desirable to
get loans from home bankers on the
cotton stored in local warehouses, yet
since this is impossible, it is better to
take foreign loans than to sacrifice
the cotton and give up the fight. Un
der this foreign loan plan the cotton
will be stored in warehouses and held
until the owner desires to sell; and
as it must ultimately be sold to for
eign spinners this arrangement will
enable the farmers to deal directly
with them.
Again, the influence of their organi
zation has been sufficient to secure
from the President and the secretary
of the treasury assurances that a
large portion of the proceeds of the
new bonds and certificates issued by
the government will be turned into
Southern banks to aid the farmers in
marketing their crop successfully.
Another expedient is the issuance of
certificates based on cotton. If a
clearing house certificate based on
stocks and bonds is good enough for
emergency currency, the farmer can
see no reason why certificates is
sues on bales of cotton are not equally
as good.
These and countless other protect
ive measures indicate that the farmer
is not dismayed by the situation, but
is steadily and intelligently holding
to the course previously laid out, viz.:
To reach that state of independence
where he can price the product of his
farm.
Success to him. —Dallas Democrat.
THE WEST WILL STAND BY THE
SOUTH.
The Farmers’ Union is being ac
cused of helping to bring about this
panic. Now, brethren, if we are
guilty of causing such a stir-up, and
financial embarrassment as this, be
cause the Southern farmer has put
his cotton in the warehouses, let’s
tie up everything that the magnates
eat and let them chew on their money.
Os course, we realize that the East
ern gamblers that sell the futures on
cotton, corn, wheat and tobacco, as
well as everything else that the farm
er produces, would like to cause a
panic. -Now, stay with them till
“Hades freezes over,” and then
spike our shoes and cross over, and
carry the tidings to our other cohorts.
We must stand by the South. The
powers have commenced it, so stay
with them. The farmers, as a rule,
have no money in the banks; but have
the bulk of their products stored.
Hold all you have, quit the markets.
Let them feel their panic; meet the
railroad boys boldly, as organized la
bor, and help them, as a braver and
truer set of men never lived. We
Missouri people are staying with you.
Don’t sell anything for less than the
“National Union Price.” The vic
tory is ours if we don’t give in. They
have sold your cotton, so let them
pay for it. Loyally, yours for the
F. E. & C. U.
H. A. JENKINS.
Thayer, Mo., in the Farmers’ News
Scimitar.
FARMERS’ UNIONS AND LABOR
UNIONS.
Farmers are the producers of all
the necessaries of life —commodities
without which the human race could
not exist, certainly not on a plane
above that of the savage, and without
which domestic animals must seek
the haunts of their wild ancestors.
The great army of wage laborers
constitute the most important class of
the farmers’ patrons. The most of
• their earnings go, or would go if per
mitted to flow in their natural chan*