AGRICULTURAL RELIEF 
185 
i came before your committee and you generously reported a bill 
out here, two years ago, trying to get some information from the 
manufacturers as to how much tobacco really existed in the country— 
merchantable tobacco. That bill failed, but is yet before you. 
Had we secured the passage of that bill we would have known there 
was no surplus of Burley tobacco, although they made our members 
believe there was and carry a portion of the 1923, 1924, and 1925 
Crops. 
Mr. Fort. That bill passed the House. 
Mr. Kenoe. No; I do not think it passed the House. 
Mr. Fort. It did pass the House. 
Mr. KincHELOE. Yes; it did pass the House. 
Mr. Keror. Did it? Then it failed to pass the Senate. 
Mr. KiNcHELOE. Yes. 
Mr. Kenoe. Had that bill become a law the tobacco growers of 
Kentucky would have been $20,000,000 or more better off to-day 
than they are. 
When we had dumped the 1926 crop and sold it for about 13 cents 
a pound, and notwithstanding they said they never would buy our 
other crops, then on hand, in less than 60 days from the time the 
1926 market closed and they had taken that crop of tobacco at 13 
cents, they bought every pound of tobacco we had on hand at around 
21 or 22 cents, and we have delivered it all to them. We would not 
have dumped the 1926 had we been able to get the governmental 
information we so sorely needed, and which the bill that you so 
generously passed gave to us. 
Gentlemen, my belief is that no cooperative organization, without 
the assistance provided by the McNary-Haugen bill, including the 
equalization fee, can ever help the American farmer. His sources of 
information are not sufficient; his power to individually resist the 
temptation of high prices and unfairness and the unkindness of 
carrying his neighbor are too much to expect from him. 
You know the farmer, if you never have thought of it, has got to be 
the best all-around business man in the world to get along. In 
his individual operations he does not have anybody to advise him as 
to the science and cultivation of crops, excepting what he reads in the 
bulletins. He has got to learn how to cultivate, to know when to 
plant, what kind of seeds to use, how to fertilize, when to harvest; and 
then he has got to be a splendid financier to finance himself on 60, 90 
days, or six months’ paper over portions of the year; and then he has 
got to be a high-class salesman in order to go out and sell his stuff 
in competition against the efforts made by trained buyers to take it 
away from him. He has the hardest burden of any business man in 
the country. All other business is organized differently, having in 
their service financiers, salesmen, manufacturers and other specialized 
employees, but he has the whole burden to bear. and his burden is 
more than he can manage, gentlemen. 
[f you would pass this legislation, as we understand it in the 
country, you are giving the farmer no kind of a subsidy; you are not 
giving him a dole of any kind; you are not making of him a charity 
patient of the Government. He wants to pay, out of his efforts, for 
all his own benefits. He can do 1t under your equilization fee, and 
his cooperative associations can operate under an equilization fee. 
Mr. Crarke. Would you mind if I interrupted you right there? 
Mr. Keno. No. sir.