The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, March 7, 1921, Page 4

Gossip and Comment on Current Affairs speculators is used ‘as a method to depress the price of real wheat when large interests desire to do so, is officially ad- mitted by the Chicago Board of Trade. In an official statement is- sued February 2 the president of the Chicago Board of Trade says: I suggest that members of our exchange, the grain trade gener- ally, the press and news distributing agencies for the present refrain from giving any publicity to so-called “grain quo- tations” from Argentine market® It is a fact gen- erally conceded that these purported quotations do not reflect the supply and demand situation but, on the contrary, are prices made in controlled markets. From the best evidence at hand a few powerful European grain importing firms, most of whom, directly or indirectly, are the buying agencies of their governments, entirely dominate the grain markets. * * * In view of these con- ditions, it is not an unfair assumption that the large European gov- ernmental buyers are using these purported quotations *. * * for the purpose of driving down the price of the product of the Amer- -- ican farmer. WE WONDER if the president of the Chicago Board of Trade THAT the selling of millions of bushels of “paper wheat” by A Statement That Is About One-Half True realizes the indictment he has drawn up against grain gam- blers generally, when he was at- : tempting to indict merely the grain gam- blers of the Argentine Republic. If, in the fourth line of the statement, we substitute the words “United States” for the word “Argentine,” we have exactly what has been happening in this country since wheat speculation reopened July 15, 1920. At no time did “so:called grain quotations” répresent supply and demand. A bro- R ker’s clerk made N alndOIglf re Is a mistake of one > e ex figure and or- Half of It dered the sale of 1,000,000 bush- els of futures when it should have been 100,000 bushels—the market - dropped 7 cents. Twelve million bushels of Canadian ‘wheat were sent to Chicago, while at the same time an equal amount of Ameri- can wheat was shipped into Can- ada. The arrival of the Canadian wheat was announced in head- lines, while no mention whatever was made of the American ship- ment. Wheat dropped some more. The wheat market has been almost wholly in control of Euro- pean buyers. One day it would be announced that all European buyers were “out of the market”; the next day the wires said they had bought millions of bushel “on the dip.” : Every word that the presi- dent of the Chicago Board of Trade has said about the con- trolled markets of the Argentine Republic is true—and the state- ment is just as true if applied to our own controlled markets. THE American Farm Bureau federation is receiving donations () OO R (O XA ) ) X IOV 7/ 7 OGN Y . u . "n' B — of corn to be sent to the starving millions of China, Armenia and Poland. Carl Vrooman, former assistant secretary of agriculture, is in charge of the famine relief project, which is un- doubtedly a worthy one. \ A North Dakota delegate asked Mr. Vrooman fecently why no corn was to be sent to the starving millions of Russia. Mr. Vrooman said: : If any Russian relief organization can secure permission from the state department to send corn to Russia and can raise the necessary funds to pay freight on a million bushels, I feel that I am safe in saying that the Federation would have no diffieulty in getting this amount of corn from the farmers. * * * But our foreign policy is determined, not by the American Farm. Bureau federation, but by the state department of the United States, and it alone has power to decide, whether or not corn can -be sent to Russia. e T Mr. Vrooman, as a former member of President Wilson;s ad- ministration, apparently hesitates to state the facts baldly. ‘The t Why Russians Are Dying From Hunger facts appear to be that our state department, because it does not like the form of government of Russia,-has condemned millions of the Russian peasants and working people to death from starvation.. PAGE FOUR s IF HE ONLY HAD THE KEY | R ] w 7 ‘ \WHERT {3 7/ i 7/ —Drawn exbressly foi-\the Leader by W. C. Morris. have taken his seat in the United States senate as the first member of that body elected by the Nonpartisan league. Dr. Ladd is an able man. He can be depended upon to do his best for the farmers of the entire West, whom he represents no less truly than the farmers of North Dakota. : ? On the eve of his departure for Washington Dr. Ladd said . Before we can hope to solve the marketing problem the govern- ment will have to build terminal elevators and storage warehouses or. the Great Lakes, the Gulf Q-S THIS issue of the Leader reaches reaters Dr. E. F. Ladd will League Program of Mexico, the Atlantic. seaboard and the Pacific, for handling the farm products'of this country for the protection of both the-producer and the con- .sumer. It should have similar elevators and ware- houses at interior points to receive and distribute farm products * * * to enable the farmer to sedure a living wage by a more orderly marketing of his produce, whether it be wheat, cot- ton or corn. ; . & Agriculture is the biggest and miost important industry in the United States and the largest single employer of labor in the country, but as an industry it has for the past 10 years been on the decline and unless afforded protection will, in another 10 years, be unable to feed . ] the people of the nation. Then will begin our national decline as a real democracy in the interests of all the people. From now on the program of- the A Nonpartisan league, which has been in the =~ . past a state issue in a number of separate states, will be a national issue. Let us Has Become a National Issue gL YOUT help solve the issue right! C ONGRESS adjourned March 4. This - session of congress was the one that leaders of both parties an- nounced a few months ago would do won- derful things for the farmers. A\ What has it done? = 9‘(@9// The War’ Finance corporation (il has been revived, but the bill was N thoroughly mutilated in passage hands of Sédcretary of the Treasury Hous- - ton, openly hostile. to the plan. There is not a farmer in America who can point to one dollar’s worth of advan- Promises of Congress Are All Broken iy T o ed from this legislation. by the farmers was beaten. After the 3 bill to control the ‘packers had . passed _{/ the senate, the house leaders 7//.. _ refused to allow the house to / take it up. The Capper-Vol- / / . stead bill, to allow farmers to / . do co-operative marketing more g / ) efficiently, was abandoned in S / 1y conference by its two authors, P both anti-Leaguers-who pretend 4 to be friendly to the farmers. 5 ; The various bills to prohibit gambling in food products never had a look-in. The emergency tariff bill was passed in full knowledge that it would be vetoed. : Before election leaders of both parties promised relief for the . farmers. Now the farmers know what their promises mean. NE of the first things that the new administration should do is to turn its attention to disarmament. Because we are maintaining the largest standing army in our history and ave building warships at a faster rate than any country has ever : ~ done in the history of the world, government Why the Seriate revenues are falling a billion dollars a year Is Oppos ed to short of expenditures. : Disarmament , " there is doubt in the minds of many naval ex- perts whether they will ever be worth more than their value in junk. The perfection of the airplane and the submarine, many experts be- lieve, has ended the usefulness of the battleship. Great Britain has stopped building them altogether until a decision can be reached. Why do we go ahead building them? When the question of naval disarmament was being debated recently in the senate one - senator (Gerry) explained that it would never do to disarm because such action would lead to “great injustice to very large shipbuilding concerns” -which have contracts for these $23,000,000 sea monsters. get in the senate more men like Ladd to- and ifs administration was placed in the -.tage which he has gain- _ Every other piece of legislation asked - ; Our new battleships—the so-called super-' dreadnoughts—cost $28,000,000 - apiece. Yet -