AGRICULTURAL RELIEF 
229 
Mr. ANDRESEN. Do you think we should do the best we can and 
report out a bill that will become a law this session of Congress? 
Mr. CrowbpER. I said, it is the duty of this body to legislate. 
Mr. ANDRESEN. The President has to approve it, or else it does 
not become a law. 
Mr. Crowper. He has to approve it, but I would feel this way 
in that respect, in recent years we have been driven from our natural 
lines of production in order to maintain and stay on the farms for 
these past years, and if it is possible—of course, I realize that during 
that time we are going to be compelled by our president to stay another 
year in the same line, I would say we had better do it than to give 
up the principles for which we are fighting today. 
I might say in regard to that condition that as it so happened in 
Sioux County, just across the river—I live in South Dakota, and 
Sioux County is in Jowa—is a bunch of Hollanders, who are very 
thrifty, industrious people, having their own churches and schools 
built in there, and that was the hub of all agricultural prosperity 
during the war period; and the inflation became a little greater 
there, possibly, than in other parts. Lands went up in value so 
that they sold for $500 to $800 an acre, that is, ordinary farm lands, 
with fair improvements, which was the excess, and it was beyond 
really what they should have sold for. But, nevertheless, that 
wave of prosperity floated out all over other lands, and I think you 
will agree with me, if you will look up statistics in reference to those 
things, that that being true, that while we did submit to the inflation, 
then we had to submit to a deflation, on account of not getting pro- 
tection for agriculture. This deflation has taken place in our country 
more rapidly than it has in others, and to a greater extent than in 
others, until to-day we are down to a basis below the pre-war period 
in the deflation of our farm lands. . 
In our own country, I can say this, that the farm lands which sold 
at 8400 to 8500 in 1919 or 1920 to-day would sell at from $40 to 
possibly $150 for the best improved farms. 
Now, with the deflation of that condition and no protection against 
loss, which I claim this Government’s business is to protect life and 
property, it has left us in a bad condition. The result is that our 
banks have failed. A bank is nothing in the world but a reflection 
of the condition of agficulture, because we are practically all agri- 
cultural m that country; and therefore it has put us down in a con- 
dition that is very bad, and the best and most progressive farmers that 
we had prior to the deflation are not the men who own the property 
to-day in many instances, or if they are they are holding on with very 
narrow margins, and hoping the time will come when they will be able 
to keep the interest up and some day repay their obligations. 
Mr. Apxins. Your relatives are all farmers and landowners in my 
district, and, of course, are a little nearer the center of population or 
where the large part of consumption occurs. Do you think by reason 
of the fact of your being a long way from those centers of CONSUIMpP-. 
tion that agriculture in your part of the country is a little worse off 
than it is over in your old home community? What is your opinion 
about that? You were out there last summer. 
Mr. CrowpER. I was, and another thing, it has had a worse effect 
upon us on account of the fact that we were not as well fortified with 
other vocations around us or other investments, and. consequently,