Deep Furrows Part 20

activities.

Fortunately the new President and General Manager of the Alberta Farmers' Co-Operative Elevator Company was not a man to lose his sense of direction in a muddle of affairs. Into the situation which awaited him he waded with consummate tact, discernment and push; so that it was not long before his a.s.sociates were pulling with him for the fullest weight of intelligent effort. The difficulties were sorted and sifted and cla.s.sified, the machinery oiled and running true, and with a valuable directorate at his back Rice-Jones "made good."

The third season of the Alberta Farmers' Co-operative Elevator Company brought the final proof that the farmers knew how to support their own inst.i.tutions. For through the 87 elevators that the farmers operated in Alberta flowed a total of nearly twenty million bushels of grain, with well over ten and one-quarter million bushels handled on commission. The Livestock Department in the face of severe compet.i.tion achieved a permanent place in the livestock business of the province with offices of its own in the stock yards at Calgary and Edmonton. By this time livestock s.h.i.+pments had amounted to a value in excess of two million dollars. The Co-Operative Department had handled farm supplies to a total turnover of approximately $750,000.

As in the case of the Grain Growers' Grain Company and the Saskatchewan Grain Growers' a.s.sociation's trading department the list of articles purchased co-operatively by the Alberta farmers grew very rapidly to include flour, feed, binder twine, coal, lumber and fence posts, wire fencing, fruit and vegetables, hay, salt, etc. In 1915-16 a thousand cars of these goods were purchased and distributed co-operatively, besides which a considerable volume of business was done in less-than-carload lots. Coal sheds were built in connection with many elevators, the staff increased and the entire Co-Operative Department thoroughly organized for prompt and satisfactory service.

[1] See Appendix--Par. 13.

CHAPTER XXI

IN THE DRAG OF THE HARROWS

"I see the villain in your face!"

"May it plaze yer wors.h.i.+p, that must be a personal reflection, sure."

--_Irish Wit and Humor (Howe)._

The "good old days" when the Farmer was a poor sheep without a shepherd, shorn to the pink hide with one tuft of wool left over his eyes--those "good old days" are gone forever. It is some time now since he became convinced that if a lion and a lamb ever did lie down together the lamb would not get a wink of sleep. As a matter of survival he has been making use of the interval to become a lion himself and the process has been productive of a great roaring in the Jungle.

All this co-operative purchasing of commodities in the three Prairie Provinces has not been developed to its present great volume without arousing antagonism in the business world. The co-operative idea in merchandizing is not confined to the West by any means. From the Atlantic to the Pacific various organizations have been formed to carry on business along co-operative lines. A Co-Operative Union has been formed to propagate the movement and the subject is vast.

But the establishment of an extending network of elevators under the control of the Western farmers has brought about possibilities which threaten to revolutionize the whole established commercial system.

Farmers' Elevators in Dakota, Minnesota and Alberta have proved that it is practical to utilize the same staff at each point to manage the distribution of farm supplies as well as looking after elevator operation during the grain season. This being so, it is not difficult to visualize a great distributing system under centralized management with tremendous purchasing power.

There are those whose imaginations stretch readily to the extreme view that the Grain Growers are a menace. Such are filled with foreboding.

They see the country merchant out of business and the whole business fabric destroyed.

"The farmers are talking everlastingly about 'a square deal,'" it is argued. "Why don't they practice what they preach and give the country merchant a square deal? What about the times of poor crops and money scarcity? Where would the farmer have been if the country merchant had not carried him on the books for the necessities of life?"

"It didn't cost the merchant anything to carry me," denies the farmer.

"He just raised his prices to me and got credit from the wholesaler."

"Then what about the wholesaler?"

"Raised his prices and got credit from the manufacturer and the bank."

"Then the banks----"

"Refused to give me the credit in the first place!" interrupts the farmer resentfully. "Do you dare to blame me, Mister, for cutting out all these unnecessary middle charges when by proper organization I am able to finance myself and take advantage of cash discounts on the cost of living?"

That is the Farmer's motive for taking action. He wants to improve his scale of living for the sake of his family. By making the farm home a place of comfort his sons and daughters will be more content to remain on the land. He does not seek to h.o.a.rd money; he intends to spend it.

If middlemen are crowded out of his community it will be because there are too many of them. Instead of having to support parasites the community will be just that much more prosperous, the farms just that much better equipped, the land just that much more productive and thereby the country's wealth just that much greater.

That is how it appears to the Farmer.

"If the Farmer is to be a merchant, a wholesaler, a banker and all the rest of it he is no longer a farmer. Is n.o.body else to have a right to live?" enquires the Cynic. "Did these Grain Growers fight the elevator combine of the early days in order that they could establish a Farmers'

Combine? Is one any better than the other?"

The inference is that the Grain Growers are bluffing deliberately and aiming at all the abuses conjured by the word, "combine." The slander is self-evident to anyone who examines the const.i.tution of the Farmers'

Movement, so framed from the first that any possibility of clique control was removed for all time. It is impossible to have a "combine"

of fifty thousand units and maintain the necessary appeal to the cupidity of the individual. It is not possible for designing leaders, if such there were, to take even the first step in manipulation without discovery. It simply cannot be done. Woe betide the man who even exhibited such tendencies among his fellow Grain Growers! These organized farmers have learned how to do their own thinking and every rugged ounce of them is a.s.sertive. They are not to be fooled easily nor stampeded from their objective. And what is that objective?

"To play politics!" explodes the hidebound Party Politician knowingly.

"To get a share in the Divvy and eventually hog it!" suggests the Financial Adventurer.

"Equal opportunities to all; special privileges to none," the Grain Grower patiently reiterates.

He believes in doing away with "the Divvy" altogether. He believes that "the spoils system" is bad government and that no stone should be left unturned to elevate the living conditions of the Average Citizen to the highest possible plane. He believes that the status of a nation depends upon the status of its Average Citizen and in that he does not consider himself to be preaching Socialism but Common Sense.

Come back to the country store--to the Country Retailer who is pulling on the other end of the whiffle-tree with the Farmer for community progress. Each is necessary to the other and it is a vital matter if the co-operation of the Farmer is going to kill off a teammate, especially when tandeming right behind them are the Clydesdales of Commerce, the Wholesaler and the Manufacturer. With the Farmer kicking over the traces, the Retailer biting and squealing at the Wholesaler every little while and the Manufacturer with his ears laid back flat this distribution of merchandize in Western Canada is no easy problem.

It is bringing the Bankers to their aristocratic portals all along the route and about the only onlooker who is calm and serene is the Mail-Order Man as he pa.s.ses overhead post-haste in the Government flying machine.

"I'd get along alright if the Farmer would pay up his debts to me,"

cries the Retailer. "I've been giving him too long a line of credit and now he's running rings around me and tying me up in a knot. When he gets some money he goes and buys from my compet.i.tors for cash or he buys more land and machinery. If I shorten the rope he busts it and runs away!"

"I'd be alright if everybody else would mind their own business,"

grumbles the Wholesaler. "Just trot along there now! Pay your bills, Farmer. Improve your service, Retailer. Don't ask me about high or low tariff. I've got my hands full with established lines and it's my business to supply them as cheaply as is consistent with quality. I want to see everybody succeed and it isn't fair to include me in any mix-up. Only the humming of that confounded flying-machine up there--Can't somebody bring down that Mail-Order bird? He isn't paying his share of the taxes while I've helped to finance this country."

"We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves," sings the Manufacturer. "Giddap, Dobbin!"

"'Money makes the mare go,'" quotes the Finance Minister, taking another look out of the window at the War Cloud. "'Money comes from the Soil,'" and he push-b.u.t.tons a buzz-bell over in the Department of Agriculture.

"Send out the choir and let's have that 'Patriotism and Production'

song again," is the order issued by some deputy sub-chief's a.s.sistant in response to the P. M.'s signal. "We must encourage our farmers to even n.o.bler efforts."

And all the while the Unearned Increment loafs around, studying the Interest Charges which are ticking away like a taxicab meter, and the "Common Pee-pul" gaze in frozen fascination at the High Cost of Living flying its kite and climbing the string!

Seriously, though, the situation demands the earnest thought of all cla.s.ses. The argument has so many facets that it is impossible within the limits of a few pages to present an adequate conception of all the vital problems that surround the Farmers' Movement. Each interest has its own data--packages of it--and it is difficult to know what to select and what to leave out and at the same time remain entirely fair to all concerned. There is some truth in many of the accusations which are bandied about. No new country can do without credit facilities.

What about the homesteader or the poorer farmer who is starting on meagre resources? They will win through if given a chance. Who is to give it to them if business is put on a cash basis? On the other hand, is the man who has the cash to receive no consideration?

The trouble with our banks is that their system falls down when the retailer or the farmer need them most--in times of stringency. It is true that the wholesaler has done much for the country, that the retailer is often at the mercy of careless or selfish customers who abuse credit privileges. It is true that the mail-order houses also have performed good services in the general task of making a new country. The solution can be arrived at only by co-operation in its true sense--getting together--everybody. Also, while one may joke about "Patriotism and Production," the fact remains that much has been accomplished by these campaigns.

Asked if the organization of the farmers meant that the retailer would be forced out of business, the well posted Credit Manager of a large Winnipeg wholesale establishment admitted that it would not mean that necessarily.

The same question put to C. Rice-Jones, President and Manager of the Alberta Farmers' Co-Operative Elevator Company, brought the same denial.

"The only men who would be weeded out," said he, "are those who have gone into the local store business without knowing anything about it and who can remain in it only because the present system allows them to charge any price they like. The men who know their business will remain. Those who are objecting to us are objecting to the very thing they have been doing themselves for fifty years--organizing."

"We want to farm, not to go into business," remarked H. W. Wood, President of the United Farmers of Alberta. "The local merchant gives us a local distribution service, a service which has to be given. We cannot destroy one single legitimate interest. But if there are four or five men living by giving a service that one man should give in a community and get just a living--that is what we are going to correct and we are absolutely ent.i.tled to do so. The selfishness we are accused of the accusers have practiced right along and these very things make it necessary for us to organize for self-protection. If they will co-operate with us to put their business on a legitimate basis we are willing to quit trying to do this business ourselves."

That is straight talk, surely. It is a challenge to the business men to meet the farmers half way for a better understanding. No problem ever was solved by extremists on either side. Enmity and suspicion must be submerged by sane discussion and mutual concessions bring about the beginnings of closer unity.