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nel, to the farms in payment for the
labor which produced these com
modities.
Hence the chain which binds these
two great classes together is a strong
one, and it should draw them very
close to each other. Whatever bears
with unjust weight upon the wage
earners, impairs their ability to buy,
and weakens the farmers’ principal
customers. And, on the other hand,
injustices done the farmer, or con
ditions that cripple the efficiency of
his labor, diminish the supplies
from which the wage laborers must
draw their sustenance.
This places thes two classe in a
position of mutual dependence, that
ought to lead to mutual helpfulness.
But it does not follow from this that
the two classes should amalgamate.
Indeed they cannot. Their incomes
are derived from different sources,
and depend upon different contingen
cies; their wrongs are entirely differ
ent, and it takes altogether different
means to right them. The wage la
borer may be wronged by a'reduetion
wages; his remedy has generally
Poeen to quit work until his labor be
came so imperatively needed that his
wages were gladly restored or even
advanced. In this the farmers cannot
aid him, because the farmer is work
ing for no one but himself, and even
were he to quit work, his idleness
would have no effect on the line of
work sought to be affected by the
striking laborers.
The farmer, on the other hand,
may be injured, not by a reduction of
daily wage, but by a reduction of the
price paid for his crops. He cannot
seek a remedy in a strike, for if he
were to quit work he would lose not a
simple wage from day to day, but he
would lose a season’s crops, and a
whole year’s income. And no labor
union’s sympathetic strike could
reach his ease at all. The only way
the farmer can find his remedy is in
refusing to sell, and that bears not so
much upon the author of his wrong
as it does upon his friend and ally,
the wage laborer, who must have his
products every dly.
It must certainly be clear, then,
that while these two great classes
should be friends, closely united by
mutual interests, oppressions come to
them in different ways and must be
overcome by different means. They
cannot, therefore, organize in a single
body, nor can their separate organiza
tions combine. They can co-operate, *
and they should co-operate, but they
cannot affiliate.
In this lies a danger to farm organ
ization, especially to the American
Society of Equity. Appreciating the
interests that bring these two great
classes together, the A. S. of E. ap
proached the labor unions with a
friendly heart, an open hand and a
God speed. This was mistaken by
some as a march directly into the
camp of labor, but it was not; it was
simply a greeting of brothers in toil,
and a pledge of co-operation in such
things as are mutually helpful.
This misunderstanding manifested
itself in the late national convention.
Labor leaders were prominent there,
and an erstwhile leader, a man who
was never a farmer and never pre
tended to be so far as our knowledge
extends, was more than conspicuous
in directing the affairs of the con
vention. And not one, we may say,
but several. It is an actual fact that
labor leaders were, by the convention,
accorded the privileges of the floor
that were denied actual farmers and
members of the Society.
We merely call attention to this
matter as a note of warning. The
farm organization that becomes a
part of the union labor system is
doomed. —Up-to-Date Farming.
INCREASING FARM INDUSTRIES
The Sedro-Woolley Courier pub
lishes an interesting story illustrating
the possibilities of increasing farm
industries in this favored land of ag
riculture. A few years ago one of the
fruit growers in that town secured a
cider manufacturing plant and began
converting his surplus apples into
marketable vinegar. The demand for
his product increased, and his plant
has grown to such large dimensions
that this autumn he has made 600
barrels of cider. In the course of
time that will become choice vinegar
and find a ready market. In addi
tion to enlarging the plant, the owner
has set a new orchard of 600 trees,
which will be utilized in supplying
fruit for future years.
Industrial argiculture offers some
of the best inducements for the in
vestment of labor and capital that
can be found in the Northwest. It
occupies a distinct field, which has
not been overworked. No branch of
the industry has an excess of prod
ucts. There is little danger of any
depreciation in this line for many
years. The army of consumers is
greater than the producers. There
is a constant stream of humanity
rushing to the industrial centers. Ev
ery new family means an additional
purchaser for the products of the
farm and factory. The vinegar-mak
ing plant is only one of the many
factories belonging strictly to the
farm, orchard and garden.
The present age of commerce de
mands concentrated foods of every
variety. Shipments must be made to
the Orient and Alaskan ports. In
many instances the foods are carried
great distances under primitive modes
of transportation. Evaporated cream
is in demand because no other form
"of milk can be shipped to the far
away consumers. Fruits must be can
ned, dried and made into jellies to
meet the requirements of many buy
ers. Even potatoes are evaporated
and sent over the world where the
raw tubers could not be handled.
Vegetables are converted into various
dainty products that command good
prices everywhere. Here are some
of the opportunities for industrial
agricultural development.
Western financiers have outgrown
the age of specialism. After a resi
dence has been established in the rap
idly developing fields of agriculture
and allied industries, the mind broad
ens and investments are suggested
by the environment. That explains
who so many new and profitable en
terprises have been launched in the
state of Washington in the past few
years.
There is no necessity for ideas to
lie dormant. Opportunities are on
every hand. The originator of plans
that produce satisfactory financial
results is generally prosperous. The
work grows in importance year after
WARSON’S WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN.
year, and even the smallest plans
must be enlarged frequently to take
care of the business that increases
with the coming of home-builders.
Here is a broad field worthy of care
ful investigation.—Seattle Post.
EDUCATING THE FARMERS.
Secretary of Agriculture Wilson
says the literature of his department
is not as dry to the farmer as to the
layman, as evidenced by the fact that
last year farmers brought 71,764
pieces of the -publications, for which
they paid the cost price to the gov
ernment, plus 10 per cent.
This investment in agricultural ed
ucation was money well spent, and
the department is better enabled
to supply the educational matter by
the nominal contributions from the
beneficiaries.
A few years ago the mails were
burdened with public documents
franked by members of Congress to
constituents who cared nothing what
ever for them, and who never used
them for any other purpose than to
build fires or to serve as waste paper.
Some of the public documents were
of value to a few people who would
willingly have paid for them a sum
sufficient to cover the cost of print
ing and mailing. Tt would have been
a great saving to the government,
both in the expense of printing and
binding, and of sending out the pat
ent office reports and other “pub.
does.,” if only those who really
wanted them and were willing to pay
something for them had been sup
plied.
The literature sent out by the Ag
ricultural Department is educational
and useful. It gives the farmer and
stockman the benefits of experiment
tation conducted in their interest, of
advice as to seeds and plants, and
methods of cultivation, and as to
economy on the farm and range.
The information that has been af
forded by the Department of Agri
culture in its bulletins and by its
special agents and investigators has
been worth millions of dollars to the
farmers and stock raisers of the coun
try, and it is not surprising that they
have shown their appreciation by
asking for its publications and by
contributing something toward their
cost to the government.
Diversified farming is one of the
results of the education of the farm
ers, especially those of the South,
and we of South and Southwest Tex
as know how great has been the ben
efit to this section in the progress of
diversified farming in the past few
years.—San Antonio Express.
MR. WILSON’S IDEA OF A GOOD
FARMER.
Secretary Wilson likes to talk
about farmers and farming, and he
ought to, for he is President Roose
velt’s Big Farm Man. The following
is given as his idea of a good farmer:
He rotates his crops, tiledrains his
lands, keeps up good fences, has good
pastures, has a good garden, breeds
draft horses and does farm work
with hrood mares and growing colts,
has a library with periodicals and
standard works, and a musical instru
ment, helps his wife in the house
when she needs it, has a spring vehi
cle for her to visit in, and drives her
to church himself, and he keeps dairy
cows or mutton sheep, or both.
But, hold on, Mr. Secretary. “One
thing thou lackest.” What is he to
do with his crops? Who is to sell
them? Who makes the price for
them? Who get the profits on them?
Strange the selling part, the main
part, of farming is never thought of,
ain’t it? He is hardly a good farm
er who does not sell his crops well.
Bring that in, Mr. Wilson, and you
are all right.—Up-to-Date Farming.
A BROTHER EDITOR WRITES ON
THE FINANCIAL AND COT
TON SITUATION.
We must evolute some plan before
next cotton season to get away from
the “Golden Calf” and the New
York Exchange. It is easy. Let ev
ery farmer put his every bale in a
warehouse and have it insured, take
receipt, and to that receipt have at
tached a splendidly engraved certifi
cate, carefully and cunningly word
ed, yet plainly and easily understood,
that it is good for 500 pounds of cot
ton at a grade not lower than sc, and
that said 500 pounds of cotton at 5
cents a pound will bring $25.00 in
gold in any market in the world, etc.,
and have the warehouse guarantee as
to its weight and grade thereon, etc.
By this means we issue the best
certificate in the wfide world, good
anywhere, and create $300,000,000 in
gold currency at once as a medium of
exchange, and keep every bale of cot
ton in the warehouses till it should
be sold, and the certificate and receipt
finally circulates back to the ware
house where it is cleared, and there
it finds the cotton or the cash wait
ing for its redemption. By this
means we make gold our servant, in
stead of allowing it to rule us as our
master in the hands of the plutocrat
ic, gold-standard New York Exchange
gamblers and the foreign vessels la
den with gold will have to come to a
southern port to unload —receive
nothing from New York.
We can do it, and now is the time
to study and plan. “In the day of
adversity consider,” every time any
gambling trouble happens in New
York or any other part of the world.
When this plan is placed in opera
tion, the south will obtain in one year
from Europe, say $400,000,000 in
gold, and it makes us at one shot out
of the box the boss of the gold-stand
ard world. Cotton in three . years
would bring to us $1,200,000,000 in
gold. And we have only to be eco
nomical and self-denying for 1908.
Keep out of debt, to beat the game.
And then we would not have to ask
the treasurer of the United States
to help us. Let him help the New
York gamblers, as he has been doing—
rob us with our own money, if they
can. It is the one great object alone
to strive for—own just one cotton
crop—and get gold for it, and then
the south is where she belongs—on
top.
Take these ideas and push them
from time to time.
L. F. Scott.
Tt is all too often the fellow who
has fooled his summer away and has
neither fuel nor food supplies as win
ter comes on that howls the loudest
about his hard luck and unequal op
portunity as compared with his more
prosperous fellows.
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