DIFFERENT POINTS OF VIEW
Even though I have a farm that at one time I went in debt for and which
I paid for by milking cows, and even though I have spent more of my
working years on a farm than in an office, I can not always pass as a
farmer. At one time I attended a farmers’ meeting where the city man
was up for discussion and a fellow nudged me and said, “Old man, how
do you like it? Haven’t we got you city guys figured out about right?”
I answered, “City people are just like country people in at least one
respect. They are just as much inclined to think their own troubles are
greater than any one else’s.”
Farmers sometimes speak of themselves as the producers, and so, too,
do the labor union men. Even the business men at their meetings are
inclined to pat themselves on the back and to take credit for a very
liberal share in production. We all look at things from our own point
of view. We have gone through certain experiences and have not
experienced others. We can not all expect to be of the same opinion.
But we all have the ability to understand each other when we are given
the chance to see things as other people see them, and it is this
understanding which I hope to promote as I write this brief chapter. I
write this not as a farmer but as a city man giving opinions gradually
formed in several years as a city milk distributor.
To me all are producers alike. The man who sews the shoe for the miner
who digs the ore that makes the plow that plows the field that raises
the wheat that makes the bread that the grocer distributes, does what
is just as important but no more so than any other man or woman in the
long line which production takes. If one may insist that his task forms
the foundation, another man may claim that his forms the roof. But what
is the difference? Without whom can we well get along?
We hear much about the “middle man” who is considered a luxury or
rather an extravagance that ought not to be permitted. Well, I am
one of those middle men and the thing does not look that way at all
to me. I think that all we do for the people--all the service we
render, is worth what we get for it. We middlemen have our troubles
and call ourselves producers and are not in any way conscious of being
“parasites.”
What economic laws apply particularly to one set of people but do not
apply to others down the line? What makes one man’s lot harder than
that of another, and who really has the hardest row to hoe? What shall
we do to the other fellow to keep him from crime and have justice?
These are questions answered in as many different ways as there are
people with different viewpoints. Do we doubt the patriotism of the
club women in cities who decided to boycott eggs and milk to bring
down the price just at the time when these commodities were very hard
to produce and the price already too low for the cost? If we do, it
is because we do not understand their viewpoint and their lack of
information on which to form different conclusions.
A few years ago I often used a certain argument which now I do not use
any more because now I am over on the other side, as they say. From the
other side of the fence the proposition does not look at all the same.
The argument is that the farmer sells his produce in town at the price
the city man is willing to pay and then must buy at the price that the
city man will sell for. Since the city man does all the price fixing
the farmer gets the worst end of the bargain all of the time.
I have no doubt that various markets are juggled by speculators of
various kinds and that there are many exploiters in cities who have
their knives whetted for any one’s meat they can get. The world has not
yet worked out its complete salvation. We all have a few suggestions
that we would not mind making to the party in power. But of this I
feel sure, the majority of business men make their living by rendering
service the same as do farmers. They are up against propositions that
are a good deal alike. I have not noticed much difference. I have to
pay my farmers a good or better bargain than they can get any where
else. In the same way I must compete for labor. I must render the
best service the customer can get for the money. After I do all of
these things, if there is anything left I may have it, and my luck at
different times is good, bad, and all shades between good and bad. All
of us city business men would make more if we could. You can at least
credit us with being ambitious, but more of us fail than do business
men in the country.
At this time probably half of the factories in the United States are
closed down, banks are practically all in a critical condition, stores
are advertising merchandise at half price and yet no one seems to buy
and the farmers’ troubles need no description. What shall we do? Well,
I know some things we should not do that I can illustrate with a story.
A man in Arizona looked down over a ledge of rocks on a cliff and saw
several rattle snakes sunning themselves on a ledge thirty feet below.
Having a small pistol he shot a bullet down among them. Immediately
there started a battle at the end of which all the rattlesnakes were
bitten. In a few minutes they were all dead. An examination showed that
the bullet had apparently not hit any snake. The snakes had all lost
their lives as a result of a misunderstanding.
I heard Major General Wood make a speech in favor of universal
military training but his argument had a different meaning for me
than he intended it should have. He argued that there will be war
as long as people have honest differences of opinion--therefore
always be prepared for war. To me it seems that since no amount of
preparation and war equipment can insure peace we must prevent that
honest difference of opinion. We must keep with all people a better
understanding. Wars are misunderstandings and well meaning people
murder each other because the misunderstandings are kept up with
censorship and propaganda. People are armed with poisons more deadly
than the rattlesnake and all will fight at the drop of the hat if they
feel that they are wronged. What then brings any hope of things better?
It is the spirit that says “Come let us reason together” that points
the way to “Peace on earth, good will toward men.”
There is one thing that all should remember and that is that we are
all of us the public. There is no corporation “without a heart and
without a soul” more heartless than the public. All men strive to do
the thing the public wants most to have done for only those who please
the public’s fancy get paid for their efforts. The public pays no
one interest on investment. It pays no one for time or effort spent.
It pays for the service it wants at the time it wants it and all who
misjudge the public demand may get nothing. Any new process or new
invention puts many people out of business for the public turns coldly
from the old to the new service which it more desires. If we produce
too much of anything the price always goes below cost. Where there is
an undersupply of any thing, there is the best market and the more
profitable business. So it is that by paying or withholding the price
this great Dame Public keeps all courting her favor and doing the
things she wants most to have done. She wins with every winner and then
taxes his income, and lets the loser lose alone.
But although we are all up against the same general laws that govern
business there is a difference between farming and most other business.
A contractor will build a building for us if we agree to pay a price
that he figures will pay his cost plus a profit. Otherwise he will
not do the work. Contracting is supposed to be a somewhat hazardous
business but it is not so risky as farming for the builder knows before
he starts what price he is to get. A farmer can not tell until he is
ready to market his crop what the market will be. The farmer must pay
the cost, hoping. Weather has a great deal to do with results in
farming operations and that makes the business more risky.
Business men in cities as a rule can work much closer to their pay
checks. This makes it possible for them to come much nearer a system of
always getting cost plus a profit. Manufacturers usually aim to take
orders ahead of their output so that knowing their cost and having
their goods already sold at a profit leaves them comparatively clear
sailing. How the farmer can get on the same basis I do not know.
But city business is not all a round of pleasure, for city competition
is keen. If one farmer raises forty bushels of corn per acre and
another can raise sixty, each receives compensation in proportion
to his crop. But if one merchant had that much advantage over his
competitor the unfortunate one would be put clear out of business.
Customers to a merchant are as valuable as pigs are to a farmer and
it is perfectly legal to get the other fellow’s customers in broad
daylight. So we in competitive business keep busier than some people
think.
I have often been asked what I think of farmers’ organizations. Well,
most business men in other lines of business have associations. They
usually result in some good. It is those who expect too much that are
disappointed. So simple a thing as an organization can not cure all
of the difficulties in farming. Some farmers in Kentucky organized to
boost the tobacco market by agreeing among themselves to plant fewer
acres. After the agreement many expected a high price for tobacco and
planted more acres. This is about the kind of co-operation we all have
learned to expect in associations where money interests are involved.
These farmers were right, however, in realizing that in order to boost
the market they had to limit the supply of the product. The law of
supply and demand always works. It works to the advantage of him who
can limit the supply or can increase the demand.
Let me tell you how a trust operates. There is an agreement to fix
prices and production is limited to what will sell at the fixed price.
Then there are fights made against any one outside of the combination
who undertakes to produce that line of goods. The trust magnate knows
well that to control a market he must limit the amount of goods for
sale by combining to fight competition. Without that feature trusts
would be harmless. A trust is a “combination in restraint of trade”--a
fighting organization. Common business men are not afraid to compete
with trusts. It is always the trust that is afraid. To compete means to
race. Trusts always want to hamstring the fellows against whom they are
racing.
To go back to farmers’ organizations, on account of the nature of
their business farmers can never successfully organize to fight down
competition of other farmers and prevent them from producing. They can
not then create an artificial market. Others can sometimes combine
to take advantage of farmers. Farmers can never “get even.” But here
is a truth that many do not realize and it is that although some may
have a less difficult business than farming, not one person out of a
thousand can avoid competition or has any unfair advantage over other
people. Those who would differ from this statement could only change
the figures in the proportion. Change them as you like, and yet we must
agree that it is a good thing that a majority must earn a living in
which there is no graft for they will stand for truth and fairness in
the land. We want freedom in the country and there cannot be freedom
without fair competition--equal opportunities for all as nearly as the
law can insure them.
Where co-operation among farmers can increase efficiency they should
co-operate. The same is true of any other business. For any one to
co-operate in a legitimate way for legitimate purpose is always a
legitimate thing to do. Co-operation need not interfere with free
competition or fair play. I have no word of warning to give to farmers’
organizations that I would not apply as well to others. But I have a
warning that I would like to sound to all the world. Beware of him
who accuses all others of guilt. Beware of him who sees only bad in
the world. There are those “reformers,” they may be called, who would
poison us against our fellows. Watch closely the suggestions of such.
Test their advice by the golden rule. A propaganda of hate is never
needed in a good cause. Peace on earth can only come by fairness and
good will. We need each other’s point of view.
Transcriber’s Notes
Page 20: “Ofter the fattest,” changed to “Often the fattest,”
Page 46: “what hapepns” changed to “what happens”
Page 56: “the fact increases” changed to “the fat increases”
Page 93: “an extravangance” changed to “an extravagance”
Page 99: “corn per ace” changed to “corn per acre”