The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, April 26, 1917, Page 8

Ra o Eooit b S W TR T e e N £ BN e —— This picture, taken at the Agricultural college, shows a cattle judging contest for boys. As a result of the work carried on by the extension department of the col- lege among the boys and girls many of them learn to be experts in scientific farming and sfock raising. The l?oys learn quite as readily as adults what are the points that determine the fitness of cattle for dairy or beef purposes and also the distinguishing marks of the different breeds. Texas Investigates the League Renters; Cattle Kings and Cotton Growers All Want State Ownership N 1860 there was not a renter in Texas. The- people who lived there owned their own farms and produced their own crops. Ten years later there were 35,000 heads of families renting farming lands in Texas. They increased in numbers slow- ly during the next decade, and in the ten years between 1880 and - 1890, 35,000 more were added to those who paid tolls to the land- lords. Still the land continued to slip into private hands and the small own- ers were crowded out, bought out, fore- closed out, until today there are 235,000 heads of families paying land rent. These represent a population of 1,500,- 000 persons including women and chil- dren. They are under the feet of the land speculators, the provision merchants and the bankers. They are oppressed by usury and in debt for the years’ groceries. They struggle with each ERNEST MEITZEN of Texas other for fit lands upon which to raise the crops that they must turn over to absentee land owners, and other ex- ploiters. So keen has become this com- petition that they pay bonuses to the land owners for the privilege of rais- ing these crops for other people. They produce the world’s best cotton, but they go poorly clad. They live in a good climate, but they often shiver for want of proper dwellings. BIG SPECULATORS OWN THE LAND And while they fight to keep the wolf from the door, while they toil and ache and worry to till 27,000,000 acres of Texas land, 117,000,000. acres of the same kind of land is lying untouched by the plow—and untouched because it is owned by speculators. The real farmers can’t get it. Hobart Chatfield, world famous polo player, known to every sporting editor in the country for his care-free daring, owns 3,000,000 acres of the best land in the Panhandle. Mrs. . Ellen King, the “cattle queen”, owns 1,500,000 acres. It is said of her that it is forty miles from her front door to her front gate. C. A. Swanson owns 1100 sections of land in western Texas, and a Scotch syndicate owns four whole counties in the Northwest. But 1,500,000 farmers of Texas own not an acre. Is it any wonder they are calling for the National Nonpartisan League? . Is it any wonder that Democratic Texas reaches out the hand of fellowship to Republican North Dakota, where the League originated, through this non- partisan movement? Need any ‘Northwestern state be surprised to learn that the Land League of Texas, the most vigorous expression of its people against this oppression, has sent Ernest Meitzen to investigate the Nonpartisan League and enlist its aid in freeing Texas’ farmers? Mr. Meitzen has been in North Da- kota and is now in Minnesota address- ing Nonpartisan League meetings. He has been in the field with_the organiz- ers, seen the enthusiasm, stood by while farmers signed up for two years more, and heard their declarations that they will never quit. And when he had finished a week of this kind of ex- perience he said: NONPARTISAN LEAGUE. BEST PLAN YET g “I find you have benefited by all the experiences of all the farmers’ organi- zations of the past. You bave the cream of them all. You have the best plan yet. The South is ready. We want the National Nonpartisan League. I did not come to find out whether it was good or not, for we have been hearing of the League for a year; but I came to observe it at work, the bet- ter to help it get under way in our state. F “We Southerners were horn Demo- crats, you know. We can't quite get “over that. But we can still be Demo- crats and also -be Nonpartisans. That is the beauty of your organization— that it can bring together the irrecon- cilable. 'We have an economic organiz- ation, the Land League. But we found out this year finally- and for certain that economics can’t walk alone. We must have political power. We had a good bill in the legislature+a tax bill that would have brought relief to the renters, but our legislature intro- duced half a dozen others to draw fire, and they all died in committee or on the calendar. ' Then the Land league knew it was all over. No more use to go there for -help until we go with power in our hands. - ‘“When the legislature killed our land tax bill, the executive committee call- ed ting and decided to send a rep- res ive to St. Paul to get the aid of the great farmers’ movement that is going to unite the forces of labor and agriculture of the whole country. Our (Continued on page 13) . He Knows thé Ropes J. H. Calderhead of Cartwright, N. D., new secretary to the state board of railroad commissioners, is a man of ripe and wide experience in public af- fairs and railroad matters. He has always been on the firing line of prog- ressive movements both in labor and farm reform since the time he joined the Knights of Labor in 1883, and was a member of the Kansas legislature three years later. Throughout his con- nection with railroading, Mr. Calder- head has always been a strong union man, and in 1894 as president of the Butte (Mont.) American Railway union, he lost his position because of the Pullman strike. Mr. Calderhead was born at Concord, Ohio, August 28, 1848 and grew up on a farm. He attended the public schools, and later also several terms at Franklin college, New Athens, Ohio. At the age of twenty he moved with his parents to Kansas and he farmed there for six years, entering the service of the raidroads in 1874 and remaining in railroad work for 10 years. In 1886 he was elected to the Kansas legislature and served one year, but two years later he removed with his family (having been married in 1884 to Maggie J. Ryan) to Montana. Here “he again went into the railroad service as chief clerk in the auditor’s office, where he remained until he went out with the strikers in 1894, His activity along reform move- ments was shown in his leadership of the Butte American Railway union and by the fact that he was chairman of the Peoples party of Montana inm 1894- 96 and an active member of its nation- al committee for the next 10 years. He was also chairman of the industrial conference held in Butte in 1894, at which time the Montana Federation of Labor was formed. After leaving the railroad service Mr. Calderhead was appointed, in 1897 as commissioner of the bureau of agri- J. H. Calderhead, new secretary to the N. D. Railroad Commission. culture and labor of Montana, and he held that position for three years, when he resigned to become state au- ditor, a position which he held for four Yyears. He later moved to North Da- kota, and in 1908 again entered the service of the railroads and remained with railroading until 1914, most of the time as station agent at Buford. In that year he left the railroad service and went to his homestead in McKen- zie county, where he has been farming since that time, until he was chosen by the railroad commission to take charge of its clerical work at Bismarck. Do you know what’s wrong with YOUR organization? John E. Paulson told it the other day in Grand Forks. Hewas speaking to the Old Gang of the Fifteenth assembly and other leading politicians. “When they do organize I tell you gentlemen that YOU ought to control it”, he said. That’s what’s wrong with YOUR organization. laugh. They are serious about it. The OLD GANG doesn’t control it. Don’t They mean it. : :