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Show h "7Ueoffane tT WASHINGTON sJdK Wa,,er shead I WNU Washington Bureau 621 Union Trust Building Farmers' Welfare Dependent On Industrial Prosperity 'TpHE nation's six million farm : families, together with other millions mil-lions almost wholly dependent upon agriculture, should feel a deep and growing concern about forces now at work. These forces either will or 1 will not bring about industrial peace, and a full and complete postwar economy In the country. As so often has been pointed out, agriculture and the 35 million people peo-ple supported by it are mainly dependent de-pendent upon labor and industry for material prosperity. It Is axiomatic there can be no prosperous agriculture agricul-ture without large purchasing power In the non-agricultural fields. Secretary Sec-retary of Agriculture Clinton P. Anderson An-derson forcefully called attention to this fact recently in an address at Oklahoma A. & M. college when he said: "Farmers cannot afford to forget that their income Is derived de-rived mainly from the spending of non-farmers. If agriculture Is to be prosperous, the first essential is that city people must have plenty of buying power pow-er and that means full employment employ-ment at good wages." So farm leaders, during this congressional con-gressional recess, are making an interim appraisal of pending legislation legis-lation affecting agriculture directly, and labor legislation which will have an effect upon farm income. The Farmers Union, considered the most liberal of the farm organizations, organiza-tions, is strongly in favor of the Murray full-employment bill. It also approves the proposed emergency unemployment compensation bill to give laid-off workers an additional $25 for 26 weeks, and specifically favors the food allotment bill introduced intro-duced by Senator Aiken (R., Vt.) which would provide more food for some 18 million low income families fami-lies through a nation-wide food stamp plan. Better Diet for All Roughly, this measure has a twofold two-fold purpose ... to make an adequate ade-quate diet possible for every family and to increase the demand for farm products. It Is estimated that this will cost from $750,000,000 in prosperous pros-perous years to $2,500,000,000 in depression de-pression years. This measure was introduced last year by Senator Aiken Ai-ken and Senator LaFollette (Prog., Wis.) but because of the war's uncertainty, un-certainty, no action was taken. Sen. Elmer Thomas (D., Okla.), chairman chair-man of the agricultural committee, is said to favor the measure. It Is significant that much of this legislation in behalf of labor was Introduced by representatives from farm states. . . . Murray of Montana, Mon-tana, Aiken, Vermont, LaFollette, Wisconsin. Senator Pepper (D., Fla.) introduced the minimum wage increase bill and Congressman Pat-man Pat-man (D., Texas) sponsored the companion com-panion full-employment bill In the house. There Is an old adage that "you can't reason with a hungry hun-gry man" and so empty stomachs stom-achs have a direct bearing on political action and political beliefs. be-liefs. If we do not have a full postwar economy, then we may very well have thousands of empty stomachs. Hunger breeds socialism or worse. The American Farm Bureau federation, fed-eration, while it has not yet taken a definite stand on these specific measures, plans an executive board meeting in Chicago in September to draw up its legislative program in time for the scheduled opening of congress in October. It is certain, however, that the Farm bureau recognizes rec-ognizes that maintenance of a high national income in the postwar years with "full production and full employment" is imperative to our national welfare. Economic Balance Sought It is true that in some areas there have been rumblings from farmers against high wartime wages . . . that these wages have lured men away from farms . . . that workers should have saved enough to tide them over. Nevertheless, the consideration con-sideration Is now peacetime wages with shorter hours and no overtime. Labor does not expect to receive war wages In peace time, nor does the farmer expect to get war prices in peace time. What both farm and labor leaders here are striving for is a standard of wages and prices which will assure an economic balance bal-ance In the postwar era. High on the list of musts in agricultural agri-cultural legislation is the program supported by all farm organizations, to regroup farm credit and loaning agencies into one Independent agency. agen-cy. This will mean a complete reorganization re-organization of the department of agriculture. Secretary Anderson has already made a start in this direction direc-tion by revamping the war food agencies into commodity divisions, wkh a direct line of responsibility! The general idea behind the independent inde-pendent farm credit agency is still to loan federal money, but to create closer local control for its use. |