The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, December 30, 1915, Page 6

= ) SIX . PUBLISHED WEEKLY . Official Paper of the Farmers Nonpartisan Political League of N. Dak. Entered as second-class matter September 3, 1915, at the post office at Fargo, North Dakota, under the Act of March 3, 1879. D. C. Coates, - - - = - 2 - - Managing Editor Advertising rates on application. @ Subscriptions, one year, in advance, $1.60. Communications intended for the paper should be addressed to the Non- - partisan Leader, Box 919, Fargo, N. Dak. and not to any individual The Leader solicits adverticements of meritorious articles needed By farmers. Quack, fraudulent and irresponsible firms are not knowingly ad- vertised, and we will take it as a favor if any readers will advise us promptly should they have occasion to doubt or question the reliability of any firm which patronizes our advertising columns. Discriminating advertisers recognize The Nonpartisan Leader as the best medium in the state of North Dakota through which to reach the wide- awake and up-to-date farmers. . ANOTHER BANK FAILURE HE Pittsburg Bank for Savings, with deposits of nearly eleven million dollars, closed its doors last week. The week before it was a Tennessee bank. This is getting to be a very popular way of making money—start a bank, get a lot of deposits and then close the doors. A MAN WHO KNOWS WHAT HE IS SAYING OHN J. BATES of the immigration department of the Soo line undoubtedly knows what he talks about. He said things at the convention of the state Federated Com- “mercial Clubs last week, that should be printed in big, red letters and pasted up in every place of business in the state. Here are his words, as reported by a Leader representative: . “Some of your clubs are after bigger population for your cities and are boosting for the establishment of factories. Let me tell you that you are getting the cart before the horse in your campaign. The farmer is the man you want to boost, for he makes your cities; without him you would have no cities. Make conditions the best you can for the farmer; make those that are here prosperous and conditions such that others can come in and prosper. Then your cities will grow, and then there will be such a demand for factories that they cannot be kept from springing up.” : There is common sense and good logic in such talk as that. We wonder what those North Dakota towns, which have given the farmers the dirty end of the deal in the past two years, think of that kind of talk. Doubtless they do not know such words were uttered for the daily papers never said boo! about it. BEARING US WITNESS HE Nonpartisan Leader has been saying that 10 per cent | and 12 per cent interest is entirely too much. It was B pointed out that for short time loans and with the un- certainties of farming the burden is entirely too heavy. Certain interests have found fault with the Leader for this agitation. Now comes L. J. Bricker, immigration agent of the Northern Pacific railway, in his talk at the annual convention of the North Dakota State Federation of Commercial Clubs and says: “No other business can pay more than 6 per cent for money; how can farmers? They can’t. There may be a farmer here and there who can pay big interest and get out from under it, but for the general run of farmers more than 6 per cent interest as a steady diet is fatal. Ten and twelve per cent can not run along with hog cholera, hail or a sick wife without disaster.” We take it that Mr. Bricker is not a wild-eyed agitator but is a sober, level-headed and well ballanced business man. He says no other business can stand more than 6 per cent. We believe he knows what he is talking about. He says ten and twelve per cent, taken in connection with the uncertainties of farming will bring disaster. Will some of our critics now please land on Mr. Bricker? : IS THE LEADER A LIAR? HE Leader has been charging that the bankers are not the warm friends of the farmer that they profess to be. It has questioned that the bankers really desire to cooperate with the farmer as many of them claim they do.' We regret that this appears to be so. We are sorry that we are obliged to make the charges. : : But we are not alone in making such charges. is a statement:we want you to read very carefully: “It’s all right to talk about getting the cooperation of the bankers in a plan like this but there will have to be some radical reform among bankers of North Dakota before they will drop Ketty iealousy and pull together for the farmer. To show you ow the bankers ‘cooperate’ to help land owners I will cite an instance which came to’ my personal attention. If a farmer or anybody else wents to.sell the banker asked to value it for the purchaser often enough will put a rediculous value on’it, because . the owner doesn’t trade at his bank. In the case I speak of a banker, through petty spite, put a value of $1200 on a fiece of land, for which the purchaser afterwards was induced to pay $2000, and the rwurchaser took $2400 in crops off the place the first year.” : This umcomplimentary remaifk was madebyMr The odbré A. The following ~member should keep in mind his duty. THE NONPARTISAN LEADER THE NONPARTISAN LEADER Koeffel, in an address before the convention of North Dakota Federated Commercial Clubs, in Fargo last week. 2 . Is Mr. Koeffel a disgruntled strife-breeder? We think not. He is a member of the Bismarck Commercial Club. But that he knows what he is talking about, we predict that the bankers themselves will not- question. CAPITAL REMOVAL CONTEST N this issue of the Leader the Capital Removal Associa- [. tion of New Rockford. N. D., occupy two pages of advertising space in presenting the arguments of that association for the removal of the capital from Bis- marck to.their home town. From week to week the associa- tion will run advertisements presenting further arguments and- facts along the same line. The Leader has nothing to say at this time concerning the merits of this attempt to remove the capital of the state to New Rockford, but we are favorable to the principle of allowing the people to vote on any important orfundamental political question. Our readers should inform themselves on this subject, as it will undoubtedly be one of the questions on the ballot this fall. : Signing of petitions to submit this question is not de- claring how one stands on the question, but is merely saying the signers favor the opportunity of the people to vote on it. The best way to get the merits of a case presented and argued is to submit the question to the: people. When petitions are signed they should be sent to the Capi- tal Removal Assocation, New Rockford, N. D. 2 THE JOKE IN CONGRESS OME of the facts about legislative conditions in this coun- try would not be believed in other countries. - For instance, farmers have been trying for more - than fifteen years to get Congress to enact a thing so simple, obvious' and necessary as relief from the present out- rageous burdens of unfair or fraudulent grain grading. Many hearings have been had and many arguments offered in both houses. Nothing else has been done. Even timid, halfway and in- effective measures- looking to any kind of improved conditions in grain grading have always perished in committees. * Yet when a corporation wants to get a great public privil- ege like the Keokuck dam the bill goes rushing through in eight days. - : : For all this we blame Congress and say it is rotten. Why, But how about ourselves? i Three fourths of the members of Congress are lawyers and bankers. Lawyers and bankers constitute about 1 per cent of the population. Suppose farmers were represented in Con- gress in proportion to their numbers. How long ‘do you think a bill to take some of the vparasites from the farmer’s back would be just a joke. ; Well, why shouldn’t the farmers have representation in proportion to their numbers? If anybody knows a reason, let him pipe up with it. Now’s the chance to have it heard. yes. GET -SPLENDID RESULTS FROM AD FEW weeks ago when A. Rickmore, F. P. Hutchinson and M. L. Mark of Tuttle, N. D.,, had three carloads of stock to ship to market, they decided to ship to the J. R. Kirk Commission Company of St. Paul because that firm advertised in the Leader. They shipped the stock without saying a word in advance to the company and when the returns came in, they report to the ‘Leader that they got the best ser- vice they ever had and a better price than they had ever gotten from any other commission house. We have been telling our members and readers that the firms advertising in the Leader were reliable concerns and that they could do business with them with confidence of fair treat- ment and this return proves it. : So both advertisers and patrons are getting results from this paper which they never received before. : The Kirk Company also writes the Leader that they have received many inquiries and much- business from their ad in the Leader and promise larger advertising for the coming year. In- formation of a like character has come from other sources and as we get them hereafter we are going to mention them in these columns. This proves beyond any words of ours the value of the Leader, both to readers and advertisers, and we must make it more valuable as the weeks pass by. - ; _ Now let our readers carry out their pledges to patronize : the advertisers in the Leader in preference to all others and we will continue to have the best and strongest paper in this state to carry on the fight of the farmers for better conditions. Not only that, but as our advertising patronage increases we will . make a better, bigger and more interesting Leader. So each Many new advertisers are appearing in the Leader each