(4) We believe support prices of perishables should be at full parity as long as a reasonable outlet for same can be obtained. This includes fruits, vegetables, and all livestock products and livestock.

(5) We believe that the Federal Government should expand the foreign trade even if it requires less military aid. We believe a lot can be accomplished for peace this way.

(6) Soil conservation is very important and the Government should give more and more aid to farmers in the lower bracket of income so this can be accomplished. Flood control is a must and should be promoted-such as building dams like the Garrison Dam at Riverdale, N. Dak., and power from these dams and power stations should be sold direct to the public at costs.

(7) Crop insurance on all crops should be at an experimental basis till a good solution can be established.

(8) We do encourage the Government to form an adequate system for farm credit-especially by giving aid to young farmers who wish to purchase farms. This report is from the authorized representative of the Nelson County Farmers Union, State of North Dakota, with a membership of 955. John Fretheim, of McVille, N. Dak., authorized spokesman for same.

NELSON COUNTY FARMERS UNION,
CLIFFORD FORENG, Secretary.
JOHN FRETHEIM, Spokesman.
GILBERT N. BERG, Director.
GEO. VREM, Director.

To the Special House Subcommittee on Agriculture, Watertown, S. Dak.: We the members of the Wayzetta Farmers Union Local No. 488 respectfully ask you to work for 100 percent parity on all farm commodities.

Benson has now been in office for 8 months and has done nothing about falling farm prices. We are wondering if the intentions, sincerity and promises made by Eisenhower at Kassen, Minn., last year meant anything. We are also wondering what happened to the investigation that was started to see who was getting the profit between the farmer and consumer. We would like to have this invesigation resumed to show the city people and laboring men that the prices that the farmer is getting is not the cause of the high cost of living.

MOUNTRAIL COUNTY, N. DAK.

WAYZETTA LOCAL No. 488,
HAROLD SKOAR, Secretary.

We the members of the Lunds Valley Farmers Union Local No. 496 recommend 100 percent of parity and no sliding scale and no two-price system; price stabilization for perishables.

Recommend finding new world markets and stop imports of grain into this country which surely hurts our own farmers; continue and expand soil conservation practices.

Recommend a Federal agency for securing farm loans such as FHA; make larger appropriations so small farmers and returning servicemen that want to start farming have some backing.

We have to have price supports on all livestock; many farmers depend on the income from their cattle for their living.

We need all these things if we are going to keep up with the high cost of living and the ever-rising price on farm machinery.

LUNDS VALLEY LOCAL No. 496,
Mrs. ERVINE FOOTH, Secretary.

MOUNTRAIL COUNTY, N. DAK.

REPRESENTING CASE COUNTY FARMERS UNION

I am a farmer near Kindred, N. Dak., farming 320 acres and believe that it is necessary that the Government take a helping hand in determining prices on farm products and that price and marketing problems should and must be handled by the Federal Government, because it is useless to protect and subsidize business

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manufacturing, processing distribution, and commerce without also protecting the other segments of our economy.

There should be minimum price supports through loans and purchase agreements on not only basic but all farm commodities, even though production controls are a necessity to prevent surpluses. We, the farmers, do not believe in a program of making prices higher by creating scarcities in foodstuffs and fibers. It is necessary that the Federal Government stay in crop-storage program in order to protect the United States people as well as the farmers.

We feel the farmer should have a larger voice in administration of farm programs. All county, community and State PMA officials should be elected by the farmers of that district. Only by active participation in the program by the farmers will bring understanding and responsibility to make programs work effectively.

We must strengthen and protect REA and other cooperative enterprises to the interest of maximum efficiency by available funds at lower interest rates for such tangible assets as transmission lines, generating plants, etc., because, without these, farmers and rural areas are again at the mercy of electric companies. Much has been done in the past decades. To curtail this would be a hard blow to rural life and so to the people of United States indirectly.

J. MELTON MYHIE, Kindred, N. Dak.

STATEMENT FROM ROLLAND REDLIN, OFFICIAL REPRESENTATIVE FOR THE OVER 800 MEMBERS OF THE DIVIDE COUNTY (N. DAK.) FARMERS UNION

To the Honorable Members of House Agriculture Subcommittee Meeting in Watertown, S. Dak., October 13, 1953

GENTLEMEN: Our first thought is to express deep appreciation for the prompt and efficient attention which the present administration gave to the problem of support prices for grains of extremely light test weight. The program for support prices for 40- to 50-pound wheat was a great step forward in salvaging the purchasing power of the farmers of our area, many of whom had their crops severely damaged by rust, hail, and drought. While I am referring to the rust problem, let me at this point strongly urge the present administration to expand and accelerate research on rust diseases looking toward the development on wheat varieties which will be more resistant. My farm lies only 18 miles south of the Canadian border in far northwest North Dakota. Up there we are very seldom plagued with rust; yet, this year, wheat stands of good promise had their yields cut from 60 to 80 percent by the rust disease.

When considering what is generally referred to as the farm problem, we believe that certain basic standards should be established against which all proposed programs or policies which are aimed at solving the farm problem must be weighed. The first standard must always be that the program or policy conforms to and enhances the general welfare of all the people of our great democracy. Another standard, we believe, must be that the program or policy fosters the growth of family-type farming. By that we mean the establishment of homes out on the land with facilities sufficient to maintain a decent and comfortable standard of living.

We do not expect the creation of a wonder farm plan which of itself will solve the farm problem nor will it solve the problems of the production of any one commodity. However, out of the experience and trials of the past 2 or 3 decades, our membership believes that certain concepts and programs have proven their worth.

No longer will our farmers be content to have farm prices determined solely by speculation and market manipulation. We farmers feel justified in requesting 100 percent of parity prices for the products of our farms. True parity prices are prices fair to us farmers and to the consumers of our products, therefore, we feel fully entitled to ask for a price support or loan program which will provide 100 percent parity prices for our produce. We will vigorously oppose any attempt to flex, squeeze, cut, or slide support prices below the 100 percent parity level to which we believe we are entitled.

The highly mechanized farms of today require continuing and substantial cash outlays throughout the year regardless of what type of farming is being done. While we are primarily wheat farmers in our area we are greatly alarmed when we hear of sheep selling for $3 or $4 a head, and cattle selling for under 7 cents per pound at local sale rings in our area. We sincerely believe in, and will

actively support, support programs which will protect all major farm products. An "on-again off-again" support program which chases farmers from the production of one commodity or product to another as they seek to produce that which is price protected, can never lend itself to stable and efficient agricultural production.

The farmer-elected committee system of administrating farm programs is another great application of the principles of democracy in this free Nation of ours. This concept of administration ought to be maintained and cherished.

The experience of FHA and similar programs of long-term low-interest loans to qualified farmers has proven the worth of such programs in our estimation. We sincerely hope that the present administration will take immediate and aggressive steps to arrest any increase whatever in interest rates on farm credit. We believe recent interest advances have had a stifling effect on our whole national economy and constitute a major reason why farm machinery, for example, continues to pile up in dealers' hands.

Surely adequate long-term low-interest credit is a major building stone which we will use to construct a family-type agriculture. Family-type agriculture can never bridge the gaps in farm income which result from rust, hail, insects, drought, frost, heat, and floods, when gas, oil, and fertilizer must be bought and paid for with cash every year. Adequate credit on a long-term low interest may not of itself save family-type agriculture but gentlemen, I plead with you that unless this credit is available to families who want to live on the land and make a home, these homes will continue to disappear from the landscape of America. We believe that farm-family homes are important to American democracy.

Never in the history of agriculture has a program for rural people been so readily accepted and gratefully received as has the program for rural electric cooperatives. The programs for electricity and telephones for farm people have contributed greatly to raising the standard of living of farm families while at the same time expanding the markets for the products of our manufacturing industries. We fail to see any need for raising interest rates on loans to any electric cooperative. We hope this administration will be alert to the power needs of our farm cooperatives and act to assure that power will be available to meet the expanding needs of power on the farms of America. We must frankly admit that we cannot agree with some power policies recently proposed by this administration. We believe that the Government and cooperatives must have the right to build generating plants of their own and build transmission lines of their own.

Experience seems to have proven that Government encouragement for soil conservation practices is highly justified. The practices encouraged and instituted by Soil Conservation Service make major contributions toward keeping the productive capacity of our Nation protected and insured. Assistance and counsel in conservation work given to farmers is another major building stone used in constructing family-type agriculture. The huge equipment needed for efficient earth moving, for example, could never conceivably be purchased and operated by family-type farmers.

All risk crop insurance also has emerged from the experience of past years as a very valuable tool in helping all farmers and family-type farmers in particular.

All of these programs built out of the experience of the last several decades, we believe, deserve a place in the pattern of any new agricultural approach. Now then, as we strive to develop new and improved farm programs for the benefit of agriculture and the Nation, we hope that these past programs of proven worth will be incorporated.

We fail to see cause for the alarming talk about agricultural surpluses. Our great free and Christian Nation stands as a strong beacon of hope in a world upon which the atheistic scourge is steadily tightening its grip. Surely great portions of our so-called surpluses ought properly be used to help the welfare of underprivileged and oppressed people in many parts of the world. The cost of Government surplus commodity operations looms large in the minds of many as being wasteful and extravagant, however, if we related this cost to our total preparedness and defense expenditures, we would readily see that in its true significance the costs of Government food programs are not excessive. We compliment the present administration for their forthrightness in using our crops to feed the hungry people at Pakistan. Indeed we believe that continued and expanded operations of this type will prove to the world we are a Christian Nation. Food must be a tool of top priority in any realistic effort aimed at winning friends for the free world.

We grain farmers believe that such a farm program demands new concepts of the storing and handling of grain. We must recognize that our population may some day overtake our ability to produce food unless we plan our program from this point on with that responsibility in mind. Unmanageable surpluses, to a large extent, are merely a matter of how you look at it. On our farms, a 1,000-bushel bin with 1,100 bushels in it looks crowded, but the same grain in a 2,000-bushel bin looks entirely lost. When we admit that food is an essential element of our national strength we must be prepared to accept the fact that our Government ought to have the right to own and operate large food-storage facilities if necessary. Surely, dispersed storage facilities in smaller terminals throughout the Nation and on the farm storage is as yet far from adequate.

We hope that a new approach will be made toward the financing of price support and loan programs. We do not believe that the farmers of this Nation should have to go to Congress every 2 years in a sort of "tin-cup" operation in order to have funds appropriated for the operation of the program which protects our farm prices. We hope some semblance of permanency will be built into the devices which protect farmer purchasing power. The purchasing power of farmers is one of the major forces which go to build an active and virile business economy.

May we in closing repeat our opening contention that the backbone of America's agricultural economy must always be made up of family-type farmers living on the land and maintaining a home there. We are confident that family-type farms have the greatest ability to effect production shifts should they be necessary. We are confident that family-type farms with their more diversified type of agriculture, as a rule, are more able to carry out effective soil-conservation practices.

We must maintain the spiritual values which become a part of people's lives when they live on the land close to nature as independent farm operators. Thank you gentlemen for this opportunity.

REYNOLD LOCKEN

Chairman Lovre, Congressmen of the House Agriculture Committee: Too often we small farmers are told what our problems are, not asked, and I appreciate this opportunity to voice my opinion. I wish we had a chance to talk to more committees. While I feel that the farmers union leaders, in this State and elsewhere are pretty much on the right track, I think the leadership has been slack in getting the viewpoint of the small farmer. Certainly, from my point of view, the situation confronting small farmers is much more critical than that which they outline. I wish to speak on only two questions-finance and perishables. It is on these two issues where although I do not disagree with Farmers Union leaders, I feel their program is totally inadequate.

We need a temporary moratorium on all loans on farms, livestock, and equipment to stop foreclosure sales. There have been several forced sales in Day County. There will be quite a few more this fall. In talking to auctioners, they say almost half their sales are foreclosure sales. I was at a sale the other day where cows sold from $50 to $65 per head. At a sale barn a cow and calf sold for 22 cents per pound. Now I remember the thirties when the Government bought cattle at $20 per head, and it isn't far off to say that $20 then would buy at least as much as $60 today. And every time there is a forced sale on farms, where the buying power of the farmer has collapsed, we all come closer to foreclosure, for our collateral security shrinks with each sale. Therefore, an immediate moratorium-and as soon as Congress convenes. An adequate suin of money be appropriated for FHA and other Government loaning agencies to be made available to farmers to meet pressing debts, holding livestock off unfavorable markets and other farming operations. Funds should also be made available for land and equipment purchases, for modernization of farm homesits a dirty crime that farmers must live in homes that have no bathrooms, toilets, or even running water. Farm homes must be modernized. Perishables. A farm program must be based on abundance. We farmers, all of us, know it is wrong to create a shortage of food to maintain prices.

I am of the opinion that a farm program without 100-percent parity on perishables is not a farm program at all. We need parity on perishables more than anything else. And we need production payments rather than rigid supports. The only perishable supported now is butterfat.

And this should truly be an example of how wrong it is. I don't believe anyone who has ever milked cows would question the fact that the dairy industry needs protection. But it is wrong to put this good food in storage until it becomes unfit for human consumption, while we merrily build the oleo trade. The longer this is allowed to continue the more aggravated the situation becomes. If we allow butterfat to seek its own price level on the market with Government production payments of 100 percent of parity directly to the producer, we will be allowing people to eat this good food. And, in the long run, it will be less cost to the Government. While I am on the cost of it, I believe our country can well afford it, when a little country like Norway, which was torn apart by Hitler's cutthroats, can today pay the producers of butterfat 40 to 50 cents per pound production payments. The farmer in Norway is getting almost $1 per pound for his butterfat. I believe we should have free trade with all countries. There is an old saying: The way to a man's heart is through his stomach. I think it is true. It is also true that the way to a nation's heart is with food, not guns. The reason I speak for the support of perishables is because what we small farmers produce is perishables-butter, milk, eggs, meat, fruit-and I believe in production payments to fruit farmers as well. It would save much of the waste, it would open bigger markets. We small farmers would be able to eat more fruit. I know two families near where I live who are milking cows and eating oleo. I asked them how come? They said they could buy 1 pound of oleo and almost a dozen oranges for 1 pound of butter, and the kids need oranges. I know a couple other families who haven't had an orange in the house for a year. Yet, when we get some stomach trouble, the doctor tells us to eat more fruit, milk, and butter. So I believe that a farm program without 100 percent parity production payments is not much of a farm program. In closing my remarks, with due respect to this committee, I should like to say that regardless of what Ezra Benson says or regardless of whether President Eisenhower intends to live up to his campaign promises or not, if the Committee on Agriculture does not wish to become mere political puppets they will see to it that a real and just farm program be enacted in the next session of Congress that will benefit all of humanity.

Thank you very much.

RECOMMENDATION OF OLIVER COUNTY FARMERS' UNION TO AGRICULTURAL SUBCOMMITTEE, WATERTOWN, S. DAK., OCTOBER 13, 1953

The Farmers Union of Oliver County, N. Dak., at its meeting on October 5, 1953, did make the following recommendations concerning the problems of farmers in the Northwest, and requested that these recommendations be given to the congressional investigating committee at its hearing in Watertown, S. Dak., October 13, 1953.

1. We believe that in making these recommendations and requests for legislation that the farmers in America are not asking for more than they are entitled to, and we call attention of the investigating committee to the fact that certain newspapers throughout the land, in their attempt to influence legislation, have continually called attention to the fact that farmers of America are asking for subsidies. We do not believe that the things we are asking for in connection with our farm program are any more of a subsidy than is now being received by practically every manufacturing company in America in some form or another. We believe that assistance given to the American farmer can no more be called a subsidy than the assistance that has been given to the manufacturer. Just recently a trade magazine called attention to the fact of a multimillion dollar loan being given to a South American country and it was followed by a statement that at least 50 percent of this money would be used for the purpose of purchasing automobiles produced in America.

2. We believe that it is necessary to the prosperity of America that a sound farm program that will give farmers 100 percent of parity be enacted and that it is necessary for the economy and well-being of this country. At the beginning of World War II the Government urged the farmers to produce and to produce. The American farmer did so and we had food and fiber in abundance. But at the close of the war the farmer found himself in a different situation than the manufacturer. In many instances the Government, at its own expense, built up great factories, which were operated by great companies and corporations on a percentage-profit basis, and when the war ceased these companies had nothing to lose, while the American farmer who had invested in machinery, land, and buildings, found his products without a fair market.