AGRICULTURAL RELIEF

641

not receive a subsidy from the Treasury. Subsidies have been from
time to time granted to other folks. Why not grant a subsidy to the
farmers? The farmers will never, by any scheme we may pass, get
back one-tenth of what has been unjustly taken from them by dis-
criminatory legislation. But, Mr. Chairman, my bill does not pro-
vide for a plan that will lose the Government any amount. It only
provides for the elimination of unnecessary profits of certain middle-
men who are unnecessary and really amount to parasites living on
what they do not at all produce. °

[ have taken many of the bills which have been introduced by
others and amended them so as to make them much more effective
in the way of helping the farmer. I reintroduced them in their modi-
fied form to get before this committee and the country just how simple
is the remedy of real farm relief if we will only determine to pass such
a» measure. 1 hope this committee will bring out the very best
possible bill. .

I have been glad in the past to suggest and help secure many
splendid changes in the McNary-Haugen bill and know the bill 1s
very much improved over its original form, but it is yet far, far from
a perfect bill. I believe that it can only be made perfect by giving
the farmers complete control of their products and the sale of the
same.

I have been glad to attend all the hearings of this committee at
this Congress and am glad now on the last day of these hearings to
submit my conclusions on this great question. I realize that my plan
may not be accepted just now but I hope for it to be eventually
written into law.

I have submitted my bill to many farmers, farm organizations,
Members of Congress, Senators, and Cabinet members and have yet
to find the first man to say it will not work if the farmers want it and
sign up the contracts. I am offering it because I feel it will work and
that the farmers will approve it and sign the contracts.

The farmers will organize if we will make organization really worth
while to them. They are a little shy of organizations because too
often they are led into organizations by those who wish to exploit
and to plunder them. My bill provides for the most effective farm
relief ever offered, provided the farmers themselves will approve the
plan and put it into effect.

So the only question in doubt is, will the farmers sign the contracts
suggested by my bill.

The farmers organized. and won our independence more than a
century ago. They have organized and given their country assistance
n every war. They helped to put over the Liberty loan drive during
the last war and sent their sons across the seas to fight at the call of
their country. So, Mr. Chairman, I am sure they will enter into a
plan with their neighbors to win for them and their children a new
freedom of naming within reason the price of the products of their
own toil. Let us do our part and knowing the farmers as I do, I
vouch for their faithful discharge of their duty in full, as they have
ever done. } }

Mr. Chairman, I wish to thank you and this committee for the
~ourtesies shown me and for your most attentive attention to my
presentation of this matter, in which we are all so much interested.