6536 
AGRICULTURAL RELIEF 
Mr. Jones. Unfortunately, he could do that, if he could get any- 
thing like approximately a hundred per cent, law or no law. If you 
got 97 per cent in you would not need any law. | 
Mr. Lankrorp. This is true, that if it worked at all the Govern- 
ment could not lose any money on it and then, again, in a little while 
the farmer would be absolutely independent; he would be absolutely 
master of his own fate and his own destiny. 
The bill has another idea, Mr. Jones, and I will come to you, Mr. 
Menges, later; I see your hand up for a question. 5 
There is another feature of the bill which I think is really worth 
while, and that is this: It has a complete referendum in it. If you 
pass the McNary-Haugen bill the farmer may say he does not want 
it. If you pass my bill it enables 75 per cent of the producers of 
commodities to sign contracts and organize. Suppose they do not 
do it? No harm has been done. Suppose they sign up 75 per cent, 
and then decide they do not want it next year; it goes out of force 
and out of effect; they determine whether the bill shall go into 
operation; they determine whether 75 per cent under the bill shall 
begin operations as to any particular commodity. They might 
decide they want to operate as to cotton and let the McNary-Haugen 
bill apply as to wheat and other commodities. If they liked it they 
would get the additional signers; if they did not like it they would not 
get new signers and they would repeal the bill. That is a most 
perfect referendum, not to the voters of the country, but to the 
producers themselves; not to a majority, but to three-fourths of 
them. If the bill is not good it would not go into effect; if it is good 
and they keep it in effect it provides for the control of production 
and marketing, not by force, not by low prices, not by an equaliza- 
tion fee, not by anything else, but by a contract entered into mutually 
for the farmers themselves. All right, Mr. Menges I will be glad to 
yield to you. 
Mr. MENGEs. Your bill would not go into operation then until 75 
per cent of the farmers had signed your contract? 
Mr. LankrorD. It would not. Let me say here, gentlemen of the 
committee, I have done this: Not only have I introduced this bill 
with this contract idea in it, but I have modified and reintroduced 
some of the other bills. I took the McNary-Haugen bill and I made 
it “Title I”; I took my bill and made it “Title IL"; reintroduced the 
two fastened together as one bill. This committee can pass the two— 
the McNary-Haugen bill as Title I and my bill as Title II. Let them 
go into effect as far as being the law of the land is concerned. But 
suppose the cotton growers in Gerogia and in Texas, in the district of 
Mr. Jones and in the district I represent—— 
Mr. Jones. Why did you not introduce the debenture bill as 
“Title I117°? 
Mr. Lankrorp. Iam getting to that a little later. I will take care 
of your bill also just as much as I did the others. Suppose the two 
pass; suppose that the cotton growers in Georgia say, ‘‘ We will sign up; 
we will take the provisions of bill 77,” and they sign up and begin to 
operate under that. They would not need the terms of the McNary- 
Haugen bill. 
Suppose the people out West and the farmers there decide they 
want to have the McNary-Haugen bill and they do not care to