The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, February 25, 1918, Page 18

ADVERTISEMENTS 'Ruled Without Representation - One Senator in Nebraska Legislature for Each 28,792 Farmers Are You »Reay? —to take your place among Uncle Sam’s corps of skilled mechanics when you are called? —to render efficient service and earn good pay when you enter your country’s service, N —to take another man’s place when he is called to the front? —to be one of the army of skilled mechanics needed at home to fur- nish supplies/for our soldiers? “Our country needs ten million to twenty million skilled workers at home to make effective any army it puts into the field.”—United States Commissioner Frederick C. Howe. War is opportunity—patriotic opportunity. not be slowed, byt quickened, by the great struggle. American industries will Our country needs you—a trained and skijlful you. A few short weeks in my Big - School will qualify you. Why not board a train and come to Fargo? I will meet you. Visit my school—meet my instructors and thorough- ly inspect my equipment. Then use your own judg- ment. Come prepared-to stay if you like it. Write or wire when you will arrive. A.L. BISHOP. President Mention Leader when writing.advertisers The Cry of the Hour is fory Skilled Mechanics Nearly every issue-of the daily papers con- tains appeals for trained help. i Your Government needs trained mechanics on the farm, in the shop, in the mill, in the army and navy. Everywhere skilled mechanics are in demand. Thousands of Motor Trucks are being used in the army. Also thousands of tractors, autos and aero- - - planes—300,000 Skilled Mechanics will be needed to operate and repair this immense equipment. Who will take the place of these men taken into the service? if you will only let me prepare you in my well equipped plant. Grasp your oppor- tunity now. ! BE AN AUTO AND TRACTOR EXPERT. Come to Fargo—Don’t delay. Get on a train and come today. Fargo School of Automobile and Gas" Engineering 1235 Front St. FARGO, N. D. YOU— Grand Island, Nebr. DITOR Nonpartisan Leader: Ne- braska ranks third in the pro- duction of beet sugar, fourth in the production of corn, fourth in the production of wheat, and well up among the states of this nation in the production of cattle and hogs. The farmers of Nebraska each year produce more agricultural wealth per capita than the farmers of any other state. Their yearly production of agricultural livestock and dairy products amounts to nearly $500,000,000. They are not squandering money. on steam yachts and ocean pleasure trips, but on the contrary are having quite as much dif- ficulty making ends meet as their Minnesota and North Dakota brothers. In 1914, 65,221 farms in Nebraska were operated by their owners while 39,747 were operated by tenants. In 1917 65,216 farms were operated by owners and-53,745 by tenants. The number of farms operated by owners showed a decrease of five while the number operated by tenants increased by 13,998. Hall county is one of the richest agricultural counties in Nebraska. In 1914, 715 Hall county farms were oper- ated by their owners and 434 were operated by tenants, but in 1917 the number operated by owners had in- creased to 788 while the number oper- ated by tenants had increased to 735. During that three year period the num- ber of farms operated by owners in- creased by 73 while the number oper- ated by tenants increased by 301. In 1908, 16,108 mortgages on farm lands were filed in Nebraska, amount- ing in all to $34,408,372, while 16,094 mortgages were released that year, and the total amount of the released mort- gages was $30,701,067. In 1910 20,509 mortgages on farm lands were filed and the amount of these mortgages was $54,319,730. There were 17,668 released, the re- leased mortgages amounting in all to $31,860,431. From 1908 -to 1910 the number of mortgages filed increased by 4,401 and the number released increased by 1,474. The amount of the mortgages filed increased during the two: year period by nearly $20,000,000, while the amount of the released mortgages in- creased by slightly more than $1,000,- 000. In 1910 Nebraska farms produced agricultural products valued at $303,- 053,135 an increase of $20,469,061 over the value of all farm products in 1908. These statistics show the alarming increase in farm tenacy and farm mort- gage indebtedness during a period when the production of agricultural commodoties was increasing, and their value rapidly rising. In the last Nebraska senate there were five farmers, eight lawyers and four bankers, the eleven senators re- maining being business and profes- sional men. 2 Nebraska has 118,961 farms, 1,100 banks and about 1,685 law firms. Ne- braska bankers have one. senator for every 275 bankers in the state, the lawyers have one of their own profes- sion in the senate for every 210 law- yers, while the farmers have a senator /for every 23,792 farmers. If Nebraska farmers had the same ratio of repre- sentation in the state senate, as the bankers had during the Thirty-fifth leg- islative session, they would have had 118 farmer senators, which is more than four times the number of senators in the senate during that session. And if the bankers had the same ratio of representation as the farmers, there - would have been a very small fraction of one banker in the senate. This monopoly controlled legislature at the last session refused to consider the legislative program presented by the Farmers Educational and Co-oper- ative Union of Nebraska, an organiza- tion of 30,000 farmers which demanded that the law-making body enact legis- lation favorable to the interests of the producer and consumer. The farmers of Nebraska are awake and anxious to use their power. The League is growing by leaps and bounds _and when the smoke of political battle blows away, the next election will show that Nebraska has gone “over the top.” g : RAY C. FELVER. Doesn’t Like Editorial Advice Mentana Hands Farm Journal Editor Sample of His Own : “Job’s Comfort” : Riverside, Mont. DITOR Nonpartisan Leader: Be- cause the - homesteaders answered President Wilson’s speech by planting the extra acres of wheat and then had the har- poon thrown into them, and the farm paper editors- keep twisting on the handle and explaining why it don’t hurt, I have written the following to “The Farmer,” St. Paul, Minn.: Editor, The Farmer: In your issue of December 1, 1917, headed “War Markets and the Outlook for the Fu- ture,” this paragraph appears: ? “Farmers are quite right in their claim that with government price-fix- ing or a basic price of $2.20 Chicago, they are not getting all the market would have given this fall. They might have got $4 and by next January $56 or $6, and by May $10. : “But should war have ended as sud- denly as it began, they would be hold- ing the bag, while wheat dropped on the American market to $1 or less. The government is insuring them in their 1918 crop by guaranteeing at | least $2. The law of supply and de- ‘| mand which some of our. best little misrepresentatives ‘of the farmers in congress have pleaded to be allowed PAGE EIGHTEEN . = to take its course, is no longer in oper- ation.” ‘Why the slur on farmers in the first paragraph? I have heard of no farmer asking $4 or $5 or $10. All they wanted was the $3.06 Chicago that the more southern winter wheat farmers receiv- ed before wheat was Hooverized. The third sentence beginning with “but” seems to imply we would have receiv- ed the $2.20 price even if war had end- ed as suddenly as it begun, while , Hoover has not ceased to megaphone that if war ended, the food commission ended automatically and the price had no more effect. Has not most everything the farm- er buys continued to go up in price since wheat was lowered? And unless the price-raising of every article was stopped, as the Interstate Commerce Commission stopped the railroads rais- ing rates, was not the farmer being sacrificed when the price-fixing com- mission not only stopped the farmer getting more for his wheat, but cut it 86 cents a bushel? : : Every farm paper I'ye seen‘save one, . ‘has reeled off columns like the quoted paragraph. Why does the farm paper editor who should ‘be the farmers’ best ltriend try to‘prove to ;he wheat farm- '