The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, October 25, 1917, Page 11

Page views left: 0

You have reached the hourly page view limit. Unlock higher limit to our entire archive!

Subscribers enjoy higher page view limit, downloads, and exclusive features.

Text content (automatically generated)

- Land Hungry Go to Canada Canadian Pacific Agent Tells Why American Farmers Have Been Emigrating to Northern Provinces—Fair Farm Conditions on This Side Would Stop It When a Canadian railway can sell $3,000,000 worth of Canadian lands in a year, taking 1500 of this country’s best farmers away from the United States annually, it indicates something radically wrong in the treatment accorded the farmer south of the-inter- - mational boundary. This country needs these farmers. It can not stop the emigration by laws prohibiting emigration, but it can stop it by laws giving the farmers as good opportunities in this country as they can get in Canada. ORE farmers are leaving the United States today for ‘Capa< da thar at any previous time. This is in spite of ‘the fact that politicians say ‘the American ‘farmer.is better ‘treated ‘to- day than at Aany previous time in his history. The Canadian Pacific railway, which has been operating in the United States for several years, seeking settlers for its millions of acres of land in ‘western Canada, did a business of approximate- 1y $1,500,000 in the. United States ‘be- fore the European war began. This Yyear, according to ‘W, A. Smith of Den- ver, Colo,, the Canadian Pacilic ‘repre- sentative in the Middle ‘West, the . P. R. will do. a $3,000,000 business—that is, it will sign ‘contracts aggregating $3,000,000, : el E The -railroad requires a 10 psr cent payment down and then lends the ‘set- tler enopgh money to make improve- ments and buy stock. ‘In many cases it provides ‘“ready made” farms, with buildings all up. Payments are to ‘be made over a ‘term -of 20 years. But itreguires $2000 ‘for a settler to start in, “If ‘it ‘were mnot for the requirement of $2000 to ‘start in we could g6t ‘many times as many settlers,” said Mr. Smith recently. “There is .a great land hunger 1in ‘the TUnited States today. - Plenty of men want to farm, if they can farm on just terms and-farm ‘their own places. ‘“This is ‘especially notable. in the South, where the tenant-farming 8ys- tem has made such ‘inroads. Recently [ inserted an advertisement in the Amarillo and El Paso (Texas) and Al- buquerque (N. M.) papers. “I received 800 replies, principally from tenant farmers anxious to start inifarming their own lands. ‘But only a' small portion of ‘these ‘men had ‘suf- - ficient funds to make a new start. They had been living from hand to mouth. Of-the 800 inguiries we have made only - three sales so far and of the others not more than 20 are good prospects.” Why do so many farmers. of the United States want to make a new .start .in Canada? The tenant farming system in the South explains part of it, but listen to what Mr, Smith says about it: CANADA 'HAS LAWS THAT SUIT FARMERS “Two of our best talking points wre ‘the “State hail insurance and ‘the land tax system: X “Instead of ‘paying high rates to ‘ private insurance companies, a direct tax is levied on the land in ‘Saskatche- wan and Alberta to pay off 'all hail losses. In Alberta the rate is 214 mills. “There is no ‘tax on personal ‘property ‘in Alberta. The farmer is not penalized for getting ‘more stock and farming machinery, or for improving ‘his property. ‘This ‘means that the speculator, who is. ‘holding land out of use, is taxed so heavily that ‘he can not afford to hold his land idle. ‘It does not bear any more heavily on the man who is using the Jand, becausc he “is exempted from other taxes. CANADA-ALSO HAS RECLAMATION PROJECTS “Since the svar has started there has been an additional ‘wild land tax’ levied, running up to a maximum of $40 a section on wild land held out of House on ready-made Farm of Cavtadian Pacific in Alberta. . . League Rates in Effect Temple, N. D. Hon., H. R. Wood: I want to congratulate you and other workers on the pleasing comments the press is making from time to time on the good work youn and the boys are doing in this state and adjacent states. I have some information—possibly you are aware of it and possibly you are not.. But you know tha 1ll fated House Bill 298 that the senate gave .the axe —well to my .great amazement the other day when I stepped into a freight office perusing freight ‘tariffs, I -ran across 298 in the form of a North ‘Da- kota state distance tariff and commod- ity rate schedule and in fact it is near- 1y a reproduction of House Bill 298 with a few exceptions and.reductions in rates. ! : I am giving you, this information so if you hayve not had it before you can have it.. At least it is well to know those things anyhow. g e Crops out this way are looking any- thing ‘but pleasing or satisfactory. Field after field is being plowed under and ‘what little is left, cut up for hay, At present. things are Jdooking pretty desperate. I had the good fortume to have part of my crop, over 400 avres, wiped off by hail and now I am try- tears seeing if I can produce moisture enough'to raise the Nonpartisan, spirits in the Toots to feed the ox and the ass . through the winter 8o I can divifle with the, '0ld: reactionaries ‘and ‘the stand . pats. . S With ‘unbounded success to, you and . the organization I am, yours truly, : ; G. F. DUPIUS. THEY SLANDERED 'LINCOLN, TOO Blue Lick, Mo. Editor Nonpartisan Leader: ' Inclosed am sending you a batch of editorials clipped from the ‘St. Louis Republic, one ‘of ‘which, marked, show how™all farmers’ and other moverien: to ‘better the conditions ‘of' laboring people ‘who produce all wealth ‘will ‘be foughit ‘to the last ditch by ‘the ' great " trusts robbing the American péople, I'am an old clod 'hopper and well re- member when the Republican party came into ‘existence and the charges by the pro-slavery people ‘that all the idiots, fire-eaters and fanatical dregs of creation had ‘combined ‘to ‘build up ‘a third party which would die because there never had baen a suoccessful party along those 'Iines ‘and never ‘would be, J. H. ALLISON. Canadian government dam in Alberta. water to irrigate 5,000,000 acres. any use, This tax law was on the law books years previously, but was not enforced before. % B “It ~has been brought into -use now to pay extra expenses caused by the war, But it does not interfere with the honest farmer who is using-his land and mnot holding it for speculation. It This dam is 740' feet long and diverts lessens the tax on the real farmer by collecting the additional money from the speculator.”. . Besides looking after the new sete tler in this way, the Canadian govern- ment has put in vast reclamation pro- jects, as the. United States government has done. ; Beet Growers Petition. Hoover They Show the Food Administration the Costs of the Farmer and the Profits of the Sugar Manufacturer HAT does the average beet grower <make on an acre of beets? WNothing at-all, gener- ally, ‘but poor pay for his Jdabor and that of his family. ‘What does the 'sugar manufacturer make on ‘one acre? More than $100 clear profit. 3 ‘These answers to the: beet sugar question are given in a letter sent by Dr. R. E. Jones of Fort Morgan, Colo., to Hetbert Hoover, food administrator. J. A. Hicks of Greeley, Colo., president of ‘the Rocky Mountain States Sugar Beet Growers association; J. M. Col- lins of IZaton, Colo., president of the State Farmers Union; and Thomas Park; president of the Fort Morgan Farmers’ union, subscribe to the cor- rectness of the facts stated by Dr. Jones. Dr. Jones has sent the ILeader a ‘copy ‘of his letter to Mr. Hoover. It is too long to be quoted in full. Dr. Jones cites testimony of the sugar manu- facturers and other c¢ ¥ lence in gov- ernment investigations to show that ‘the present cost of raising an acre of sugar beets is from $90 to ‘$100 and that the cost of manufacturing sugar is approximately $4 per bag. The vield in the Colorado section averages 123 tons to the acre. . The sugar company secures 2% bags of sugar from a._ ton of beets. With 1214 ‘tons to the acre they secure 311-4 ‘bags which at $7.26 per bag are worth $226.56. WHAT IS THE COST : - TO THE FARMER? " ing' to cover the 400 acres with salty . “Four dollars per bag “will cover every item -of expense in the manu- . fag¢ture of 100 pounds of sugar,” says Dr: Jones in the petition to Hoover,.“so that the expense of making811-4 bags of ‘sugar, secured from one. acre: of beets, is $125, thus leaving ‘a'net profit to the company of $101.56 per acre from ‘the farmers’ investment and labor and the hazard which he has:taken to -produce ‘this crop. ? “Now the farmer will receive, with the sliding scale, less than $7 per ton for his beets, but we will assume that it will be. $7 flat per ton, so his 1214 tons per acre will.yleld him:$87.50, then the foliage and tops are worth $4 per acre for forage, so_that he has a total income from his one acre of $91.50 and an expense of from $90.00 to $100.00 to grow and deliver his crap. You may ask, why, if this is true, do they con- tinue to grow them. I answer that one item of expense that the Great Western Sugar company took into account was labor. It is for this reason that they abandoned growing beets on their property, for they know as a rule that, the farmer does not count his time as anything and it is this item that allows him to just make a meager living off of his farm, while the great sugar companies ‘are making over $100 an acre clear profit. P “Now, I have given you the facts as concerns the heet grower and cited you : to authorities, should you care to in- vestigate, which will clearly show you that if the wheat grower needed pro- tection from the profiteer you have a double reason to protect the beet sugar grower from this profiteering buccaneer, - for he¢ has driven almost all the farm- ers, except the foreign element with large families of little children, from the bect fields and it is . these little children and their mothers who work from early dawn to late at night, and . whose time is now gounted for nothing, that makes beet farming-at all possible. LET FARMERS BRUY LIBERTY BONDS, TOO “Mr. Hoover, a terrible tradgedy is. being enacted here. We are sure that you are totally unaware of it or some effort would have been advanced some time ago, but now that you know we feel that some effort will be made by you. e, as ‘a farming community, commend not only the Great Western but all other sugar companies and all other large business interests in their splendid spirit of patriotism, when they rush to our country’s aid in buy- ing millions and millions of dollars of Liberty bonds. We are only human and we feel that same surging impulse to support our country. in ‘her time of need,: Can not you make possible a. more equitable division of ‘the! profits in this: great. .industry,-that we may . also purchase Liberty bonds and not only,evidence our.patriotism, but share inthe 'supreme. glory of. responding. to. our:country’s-call in-her hour.of meed? “We are aware while submitting this ° report and making this request that the president. of the Great Western: Sugar company, ‘Mr. Petrikin, ‘has' spent a great deal of time in Washington and the East, we are also aware of the fact that Thomas B. Stearns, who i now .. in. control of our food supply for the state of Colorado is now building a large sugar factory, he being one of the principal owners, consequently in: the - event that you should investizate this conhdition, I presume you would largely depend upon him-in this matter and it - is :for this reason that I call ‘your at- tention ito the fact that Mr. Stearns’ interests are directly the opposite of those of the farmer.” In conclusion Dr. Jonés points out ' that although the flour mills aré able’ to make good money in making 25 cents a barrel on flour and 50 cents a ton on mill feed, this profit amounts to only $2 per acre on a field of wheat that makes 30 bushels to the acre, an unusual yield. But the sugar manufacturers, under present conditions, are making more than $100 net profit per acre as the result of the farmers’ toil. B

Other pages from this issue: