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American

Editor's Horizon

few years ago, the Farmer existed only in census statistics and the affections of politicians in campaign years. The government reports told us that there were so many of him, that he raised so much wheat, corn, oats, rye, cotton, tobacco and other crops. We knew that somewhere there were so many thousands of farms which were his home and that there he produced other many horses, cows, sheep and hogs.

A Political Description Recurrently the politician took the stump in his effort to get back to Congress or some other good thing in public life and then the American Farmer did hear things. The horny handed son of toil was nature's true nobleman. He was the bone and sinew of the nation and "other things too numerous to mention." But between times no one knew that the farmer lived. He rose early in the morning as did his fathers before him; saw the sun rise over the field of grain that topped the distant hill, worked all day and at night retired to his couch-no one knew whether it was hard or not, but supposed it

was-and the next day did the same thing over again.

Envied? Not he.

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A Discovery

If advertising has done nothing else, it has at least discovered the American Farmer, and it was a discovery worth noting, to It has taught us who live in the city, earning our livelihood at manufacturing or some other business, that the American Farmer is what the politician called him-but only half believed it while saying so-and then some. We have learned that this farmer has gold in his pockets and that he is willing to part with it for the considerations we offer him in our advertisements-improved machinery, better methods, increased earning power, more living comforts, and a good many luxuries.

Life on the farm isn't what it used to be, thank goodness, and if all the credit is not due to advertising, at least it is entitled to its fair share. In no other way could knowledge of the good things of this world have come to them. Really, it reaches even us that way only. The result is that once more there is a yearning to get out on the fa

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Secretary Wilson, in lucid and simple logic, has recently issued a statement showing the sustaining powers of the American farmer. He shows clearly that the politician tells truly when he says that our national wealth and our prosperity are to be traced to these tillers of the soil. It is he and not the stock jobbers and stock watering operators of our monetary centers who are playing important parts in the nation's financial affairs.

The significance of Secretary Wilson's statements through the press is the greater when it is recalled that these are days of great depression in Wall street securities.

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"To one familiar with the situation," says Mr. Wilson, it must appear that there will be no panic in this country now so long as the farmer of the United States is able to produce good and salable crops.

The American farmer

sustains the country and feeds a great portion of the world. He is virtually independent of any other class.

"Let me premise by giving a few figures from my annual report just issued. From 1880 to 1890 the average of exports of farm products was more than $703,000,000. In 1901 they were $952,000,000. In 1903 the surplus, which we did not need in this country and was sold abroad, amounted to $878,000,000.

Righting the Balance

"It was the farmer who kept the balance of trade with the United States. Excluding the products of the farm, there was during the period from 1890 to 1902 an annual adverse balance of trade amounting to $62,000,000. Including the farm products this balance is wiped out, and we had left $275,000,00 to the credit of this country. Dur1903 there was an unfavorable baltrade in exports and imports

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other than those of the farm, which amounted to $56,000,000, but when the farmer's part in the international commerce is included the balance in our favor is just about $367,000,000.

"Here you have the tremendous reserve sustaining power of the farmers of this country. They are the people who pay the foreign bondholders.

"I will tell you that the farmers are independent of the banks, the money lenders or anybody else. They are prosperous. They are getting good prices for their grain, hay, milk, butter, cheese, fruits and other produce. Think of the prices of eggs and poultry!

"The farmers of the West were never in such easy circumstances. Their crops have been good, and the demand from abroad has been such as to keep the prices at a comfortable figure. This is true of everything the farmer raises to sell-hogs, cattle and wool.

Crops Rule, Not Stocks

"There can be no hard times, such as Wall street predicts, so long as the crops do not fail. The American farmer is an optimist. In the West the banks are bursting with farmers' money. The farmer has luxuries such as one would not have dreamed of seeing in a farmhouse twenty years ago. The farmer often has a telephone in his house. His daughter has a piano, and goes to boarding school. The children have bicycles. "I am told that there is between $400,000,000 and $500,000,000 of farmers' money in New York banks or on Joan. From Iowa alone somewhere in the neighborhood of $60,000,000 has been sent to Canada to purchase grazing and farming lands.

"And let me tell my views about nother thing. There is much talk in Wall street about the timidity of investors. Money is scarce at times, and the market sags. There is difficulty about getting money to float this and that great enterprise. Men will not go into them because they have been hum

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