The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, October 25, 1917, Page 9

Jects political prejudice into the Liberty Loan campaign, the Leader will carry the matter to the Federal Reserve board at Minneapolis ; and then, if this political prostitution of the Liberty Loan work does not cease, we shall carry the matter direct to the Secretary of the Treasury at Washington, D. C. We will do this in the interest of preventing the - discrediting of the Liberty Loan among the people of North Dakota, a majority of whom voted for Gévernor Frazier and are now supporting him and his administration. We want to see North Dakota subscribe ~—Yyes, over-subscribe—its share of the loan, and we can not sit idly by and let political soreheads of the Bangs type use this’ patriotic work as an outlet for reflections on the patriotic farmers’ governor of North Dakota and his administration. ‘ the Nonpartisan league, would arouse nothing but abuse and de- nunciation, frequently meet with favorable quotation and even praise at the hands of League enemies, when uttered by others.” Here is a good example: ; Even with normal conditions the production of farm products is carried on under uncertainties which do not prevail with other kinds of business. The cost of raw material is determined largely by the sunshine and the rain and can not be known in advance. The price of the finished . product is subject to the most violent fluctuations, caused, not only by rapidly changing business conditions, but by a system of marketing in which the seller has no voice as to the prices which shall be paid for his product. Under war conditions the farm product market uncertainties are intensified and the cost of production is very greatly increased. Therefore in the absence of reasonable assurance of prices which will cover the cost of production, a decrease in farm products seems inevit- able. If this had been said at a meeting of the League in any state in the Union, it would have been seized upon by the Big Business press as a ‘‘veiled threat’’ against the government. Its reference to market wrongs would have been branded ‘‘disloyal’’ or ‘‘ravings of agita- tors,”’ and the suggestion of decreased production would have been dubbed ‘‘sedition’’ and *‘pro-Germanism’’. But this statement was not so branded. It has been copied- with approval by Big Business newspapers—and yet the quotation is an accurate statement of the League’s analysis of the situation. Change the words ‘‘farm products’’ to ‘‘livestock’’ (which is only a part of farm products) and you have the whole quotation as it stands in the United States department of agriculture weekly bulletin, the expres- sion of the leading livestock men of the country, who were asked by the food administration to point out the abuses in the livestock indus- try and the changes necessary to stimulate patriotic production. Big Business found no fault with the principle involved, nor with the way it was stated, when stated by these men, but similar statements by farmers politically banded togeth‘cr to eradicate these abuses—the National Nonpartisan league—have stirred up furious denunciation and vilification in the controlled newspapers. * - The personal abuse heaped upon Lieague leaders who have preach- ed this doctrine has been incessant for two years and a half. The new terms *‘pro-Germanism”’, *‘sedition’’, ete., are but a recent addition to the vocabulary of invective. The same men are using them who have opposed the League from the beginuing—and using them for the same purpose. : v Then why do these particular words meet praise instead of denun- ciation? Simply because they were made in a place and in a way that did notlabel them as a ‘‘League’’ view. There is no organzation back of the statement to make it effective. Reactionaries do not object so much to truth as they do to truth made effective, as it is through the . League. : STAT_EMENTS of economic facts, which, if uttered by members of INSULTING THE NORTHWEST . OME of the organs of the.war profiteers in the Northwest recently S have quoted Eastern newspapers which state that the Nonparti- san league, its officers, its program and its members as well as the people of the Northwest are ‘‘disloyal”’ and “‘unpatriotic’’. The " Northwest Big Business press has not succeeded in making the League look ‘“‘disloyal’’ TO THE PEOPLE OF THE NORTHWEST, so it drags - in' the Eastern press to prove the point. Some light is thrown on the position of the Eastern press by a recent statement of Congressman Baer, who says: : : I find that nothing is doing Bo much in the East to discredit the peo- ple of the Northwest, particularly of North Dakota, as such newspapers as the Grand Forks (N. D.) Herald, the Fargo (N. D.) Forum, the St. Paul Pioneer Press and the Minneapolis Journal. It is these papers that give the Eastern press and the Eastern people the false impression that the Northwest is against the war, Due to these papers, and matter re- printed from them in the Eastern press, people of the East imagine I put up an anti-war campaign to win election. Since I was elected by a big vote, they assume the people are disloyal.) This is not because of any- S A . e T S TAGHNIND . thing I have said, or anything that has been said by League members or speakers, or by papers friendly to the League, but because of the lying reports in the press opposed to the League and the farmers. Congressman Baer brings out an important fact. There can be no doubt that the insulting references to the people of North Dakota and of the other states where the League is organizing, appearing in the Eastern press, are the result of the campaign of slander with which the anti-farmer press right here at home has been pursuing the League farmers. The ridiculous part of it comes in when the anti-farmer, Big Business press of the Northwest quotes Eastern newspapers to prove the disloyalty of the League, and hence, inferentially, to prove that the people are disloyal. . : When Northwest papers quote Eastern papers as authority for the charge that the Northwest is disloyal, they are quoting their own words—they are quoting from papers that have been deceived into this view by the anti-farmer press of the Northwest. Remember this: A charge that the Nonpartisan league is disloyal is a charge that the people of the Northwest are disloyal. The Non- partisan league IS THE PEOPLE—it numbers in its ranks practically every voter in the rural districts in North Dakota.and in the districts in adjoining states which have been organized. Also, a charge that Congressman Baer is disloyal is a charge that the people of North Da- kota, who elected him by an overwhelming vote, are disloyal. And it is the anti-farmer press right here in the Northwest that is making these charges and getting them spread through the East to reflect on the people of the Northwest. % 5, 77?5/7 3 SO g/ < Yy TRYING TO FORGET HE corporation controlled papers of the Twin Cities opposing I the farmers’ organization, are not having so much to say now about the ‘“disloyalty’’ of the Producers’ and Consumers’ con- ference at St. Paul. They would like to forget the subject. But the subject will not let itself be dropped. Every mail received by the Leader contains some reference to it—an editorial in a California paper supporting the great movement, the account of a South Carolina editor of his experience at the gathering, a letter from some Montana delegates telling of a local meeting at which they reported to the farm- ers who sent them what really happened at St. Paul. Letters have come from Ohio and Illinois asking questions about the big farmers’ organ- ization which they knew nothing about until the big St. Paul meeting was held. sl : Thousands of persons in all parts of the United Sgates have re- ceived copies of the resolutions adopted” by the conference. There would not have been such a demand for these resolutions if the Twin Cities press had not shrieked ‘‘disloyalty’’ so loudly. But the people are interested—they want to know about this new organization. : So it is no wonder, now, that the old gang press of St. Paul and Minneapolis is trying to forget about the conference. ; THE LIMIT OF ASININITY HE Fargo organ of the war profiteers (the Forum) is hereby l awarded a leather medal by the Leader for publishing the prize editorial comment on the recent Minnesota series of Nonparti- san league meetings. After stating the fact that numerous town busi- ness men and officials tried to prevent the farmers from holding meet- ings, the Forum says: The program (of the League) in Minnesota seems to be the same as it was in North Dakota, to array class against class. . The aim - (of the League) is to create mutual mistrust between city and country, be- tween class and class, In other words, the farmers, exercising their rights as free citi- zens, plan meetings to diseuss politics and other things. The business men and officials of the towns try to break up these meetings. The League—mind you not the business men or town officials—is guilty of setting class against class, because the business men try to stop the farmers from meeting! Can you beat that? : ° What can the editor of the Forum be thinking of? The Leader challenges anybody to produce an editorial from a paper opposed to the farmers that contains more asininity in fewer words than this Forum editorial. Inasmuch as it was not the farmers. who tried to break up business men’s meetings, but the business men who tried to break up farmers’ meetings, the Leader submits the following revision of the editorial in the Fargo organ of the war profiteers: The program of the business men in Minnesota seems to be the same as their program in North Dakota originally was, but no longer is, to array class against class. The aim of the Minnesota business men is to . create mutual mistrust between city and country, between class and class, by attempting to prevent legitimate and patriotic meetings of the farmers.