coöperation, they would commit economic suicide, impair their productive forces, and retard the recovery of Europe. He agreed. The danger is that they will not show the requisite wisdom and forbearance and prove a curse to themselves and to the world. It makes no difference how people are grouped, how small nations are, provided they work with other peoples in Christian and neighbourly fashion, with intercommunity adjustments, as do the peoples of the states of the United States. But it is going to be difficult for the new nations to restrain themselves and to coöperate effectively with one another and with oldern nations; and they may become political and economic nuisances.

CHAPTER XIX

AGRICULTURE IN THE WAR

Division of Work Between the Department and Food Administration-Results of the Food Production Act-Agricultural Advisory Committee

T

HE part which the millions of men, women, boys, and girls on the farms and the organized agricultural agencies assisting them, including

the Federal Department of Agriculture, the state colleges and departments of agriculture, and farmers' organizations, played during the war in sustaining this nation and those with which we were associated, is striking, but altogether too little known and appreciated. On them rested the responsibility for maintaining and increasing food production and for assisting in securing fuller conservation of food and feedstuffs. The satisfactory execution of their task was of supreme importance and difficulty.

The conservation of available foods is one thing; the increase of production along economic lines is quite a different thing. It is prerequisite and fundamental. It is one thing to ask a man to save; it is another to ask him, confronted as he is by the chances of the market and the risk of loss from disease, flood, and drought, to put his labour and capital into the production of food, feeds, and the raw material for clothing.

The work of the agricultural agencies is not much in the public eye. There is little of the dramatic about it. The

millions of people in the rural districts are directly affected by it and are in more or less intimate touch with it, but to the great urban population it is comparatively unknown. Usually people in cities devote very little thought to the rural districts; and few of them, fortunately, in normal times, have to concern themselves about the food supply and its sources. The daily press occupies itself largely with the news of the hour, and the magazines have their attention centred chiefly on other activities. Consequently, the people in large centres have slight opportunity to acquaint themselves with rural problems and agencies. Although the nation has, in its Federal Department and the state colleges and departments, agricultural agencies for the improvement of farming which, in point of personnel, financial support, and effectiveness, excel those of any other three nations combined, very many urban people, when we went to war, were unaware of the existence of such institutions, and not a few representations were made to the effect that an agency ought to be created to secure an increase of production. These people saw the windows of cities placarded and papers filled with pleas for conservation, for investment in bonds, and for subscriptions to the Red Cross. They wondered why they did not see similar evidence of activity in the field of agriculture. They did not know of the thousands of men and women quietly working in every rural community of the nation and of the millions of bulletins and circulars dealing with the problems from many angles. They overlooked the fact that the field of these workers lies outside of the city, and did not recognize that both the problem and the methods were different.

On April 18th, I transmitted to the Senate certain pro

posals for increasing the production, improving the distribution, and promoting the conservation of farm products and foods. The suggestions were based in large measure upon the programme adopted at the St. Louis and Berkeley conferences. The Committee on Agriculture in each House soon afterward took the matter in hand, held extensive hearings, and finally formulated two measures. In the preparation of these, there were two leading thoughts in mind. One was to speed up and add to the activities of the Federal Department of Agriculture and its coöperating forces. The other was to vest in the President regulatory powers, in considerable part of a commercial nature, to be exercised through an emergency agency rather than through any existing department, to deal with special and urgent national and international food problems growing out of the war. After an extended debate the two bills-the Food Production and the Food Control-were passed by Congress and approved by the President on August 10th.

The Food Production Act-"an act to provide further for the national security and defence by stimulating agriculture and facilitating the distribution of agricultural products"-to be administered by the Department of Agriculture, carried an appropriation of $11,346,400 for the following purposes:

The prevention, control, and eradication of the diseases and pests of live stock; the enlargement of live-stock production, and the conservation and utilization of meat, poultry, dairy, and other animal products; procuring, storing, and furnishing seeds for cash at cost to farmers in restricted areas where emergency conditions prevailed; the prevention, control, and eradication of insects and

plant diseases injurious to agriculture, and the conservation and utilization of plant products; the further development of the coöperative agricultural extension service; surveys of the food supply of the United States; gathering and disseminating information concerning farm products; extending and enlarging the market-news service; preventing waste of food in storage, in transit, or held for sale; giving advice concerning the market movement or distribution of perishable products; investigating and certifying to shippers the condition as to the soundness of fruits, vegetables, and other food products received at important central markets; the development of the information work of the Department; enlarging the facilities for dealing with the farm-labour problem; and extending the work of the bureaus of Crop Estimates and Chemistry, $650,000.

While the Food Production bill was pending in Congress, detailed plans were formulated for carrying out its provisions as soon as it should become law. The Department therefore was ready to proceed promptly and effectively with their execution.

It was apparent that the Food Production and the Food Control acts dealt with very closely related matters, that effective coöperation between the Department of Agriculture and the Food Administration was essential, and that needless duplication of effort should be avoided. It was recognized that the relation between the two agencies was intimate and fundamental; that it was impossible completely to disassociate them, and undesirable to do so. After a full conference, a satisfactory working agreement was reached.

In a broad way, the Food Administration had as its