AGRICULTURAL RELIEF

605

and put into operation a syste i istributi
field such a way that they will i eo Bir ering Vie protyis of fin
tion will permit.
L just called attention to that to show you gentlemen.that for a
long, long time I have made a study of the subject. I was talking
then just as I am talking now, for the reason that anyone who has
studied it as I did could see what was coming—the great breakdown
of agricultural interests, the hundreds of thousands of farms that
have been foreclosed—and all this, of course, could have been avoided
if we had had what I was appealing for and urging 17 years ago.
Now we have gotten to a point where something is actually necessary,
 some action. What can that be? It does not make any difference
 what legislation is enacted; it does not make any difference
what action is taken; eventually and finally this proposition will prevail.
 This will be the final solution of agriculture, to meet the demand,
 placing it on as solid a basis as financial interests and manufacturing.
 It has got to come, and it has got to come in this way:
[t has got to come under a control.
Mr. Apkins. If I get your idea correctly, speaking of organization,
this country has got all sorts of commodity organizations.
Mr. Yoakum. I know it has.
Mr. Apkins. And every other sort of organization.
Mr. Yoakum. I know it has.
Mr. Apkins. If I got your idea correctly, it is to have some
enabling legislation so that these various organizations may be
amalgamated.
Mr. Yoakum. That is it; you have covered the whole thing.
Mr. Apkins. To get Mr. Yoakum’s record straight, he refers and
puts in a quotation of America’s wheat associations?
Mr. Yoakum. Yes.
Mr. Apkins. The overhead being from 14 tn 20 cents?
Mr. Yoakum. Yes, sir.
Mr. Apkins. But he goes on and says the local cooperatives are
14 to 46.
Mr. Yoakum. They have still got another to contend with.
Mr. Apkins. The point I want to make is this: He refers to the
wheat pool in Indiana. We have a number of them in the Northwest.
 Canada has one. Your theory is that you must have a
Government agency to sort of amalgamate them into one organization?

Mr. Yoakum. No. .You are getting it wrong—not a Government
agency, but a farmers’ agency under Federal authority and operated
under Federal charter.
Mr. Apkins. Do you know of all these agencies, the wheat pool in
Indiana, of which I know a good many men who belong, and the
wheat pool of the Northwest—do you know of any reason why under
the present law that they can not amalgamate and operate now?
Mr. Yoakum. Yes, sir; they are absolutely unorganized in a
aational way. a
Mr. Apkins. Yes; I say they have authority of law to orgamze 1
they want to? This pterstate proposition
Mr. AKUM, s 1s an interstate p .
Mr Amari Answer my question. Under the law they could
preanize?