Not of all persons will be required the same duty. What one is, that shall one give. Society will learn of every man and woman what these gifts may be. Some day it will be expected that every able person will report himself, at determined occasions, for definite service, without pay, in one or more of the following privileges, and other privileges, under orderly management and recognized public authority:
1. To clean up the earth and to keep it sweet,—streets, roads, paths, byways, vacant lots, stream banks, woods, fields, and all open, or public, properties and public works. The clean-up days now becoming popular are the beginnings. Of course this does not mean that the work of street-cleaning departments and the like is to be taken over or interfered with; but there are times for special house cleaning. If every person felt it devolving on him to help in keeping the earth decent, he would be likely to exercise a proper restraint in befouling it; and as charity begins at home, so should his restraint begin on his own premises, even extending to the parts out of sight of the public.
2. To take part in the construction of halls and premises for community activities.
3. To aid in the making of beautiful and public places accessible and to protect them. Every community with a rural environment, and practically every small city, has a near-by area that could be reserved and opened by coöperative action of the people,—days set aside when paths should be made, bridges built, retreats discovered, trees and streams put in shape, insects destroyed. Such reservations are not really public until the people volunteer to help in them.
The farther places, the real backgrounds of the race, will some day be opened as well as reserved, and made of much use to very many people besides casual visitors and sight-seers. We shall learn how to project whole counties and cities, and even larger units, into the making and keeping of them in a way that is not yet visioned. This can be accomplished as easily as armies can be sent into the field, but it will require a type of organization at which we have not yet arrived. It will be worth while to develop public-service armies.
4. To demand the freedom of the earth for its inhabitants, under proper recognition of vested rights. The conception of the freedom of the sea has had an interesting evolution,—the escape from the old sea fear, the long years of piracy, the buccaneers, letters of marque and reprisal, treaty ports, smuggling, and all the rest; finally has come the demand of equal opportunities for all and the open door. We must have the open door to fields and shores, to commanding hills that should not be exclusive property; find trails and walks and avenues to places the people ought to know. All this requires exploration, tramps far and near, maps, propaganda. All scenic parts will be marked. The public shall know all good places.
5. To protect the products of the earth; and to protect the earth itself. The products to which I now refer are those not the property of individuals,—the birds, the beasts, the fish, the vegetation. The bird sanctuaries now so well accepted are good beginnings, as also the wild-flower preservation societies, the nature-study groups, and many others; but the individual is not yet sufficiently impressed with this feeling in his own action.
To protect the earth is to save its fertility. This is the fundamental conservation. Not all persons can participate here, but every citizen can be mindful of the necessity of it and aid in creating public sentiment. I wait for the coming together of new organizations or societies that shall have for their purpose the conservation of fertility. These will be much more than agricultural and rural organizations, and their work need not be technical or occupational. They may include all persons, and the discussions and interests may run the range of man's relation to land.
To leave his piece of earth more productive than when he took it is the obligation of the good farmer, for there are constantly more persons to be supported. In the large sense every one of us is a farmer, for the keeping of the earth is given to the human race. We begin to understand vaguely what relation the good keeping of the land bears to national questions.
6. To keep the public health,—to protect it by keeping one's body well, by taking care to commit no nuisance, to contaminate no source of public infection, and to lend one's self to participate in the correcting of abuses.
To be physically fit and uncomplaining is a public duty. Maybe we shall find ways to demand physical training of the people as effective as that afforded by military training but without its sinister intentions.
Society will take over unto itself the oversight not only of physical training and of providing that children shall be well born but also more and more the oversight of the treatment of disease, as a public necessity. We shall train the sound to care for the unsound.
7. To come with personal succor as well as with money and goods in time of flood and disaster, to visit the sick and the afflicted, to relieve the poor and unfortunate. We shall learn how to organize the vast resources in men and women who are willing but do not know how, who are undiscovered and untrained, yet who could be shaped into a great army of assistance.
8. To respond promptly to the call of societies or groups that act in the public interest; to participate in the many neighborhood coöperations.
As an illustration of the manner in which a military equivalent may be determined, an illustration has been taken from some agricultural activities. Before considering the military equivalent in farm work it is necessary to give a brief description of the basis upon which the Military Training Commission will probably work in this matter. The basis, in brief, is the "man work unit" idea as developed by Dr. George F. Warren, Professor of Farm Management, New York State College of Agriculture.
A man work unit is the average amount of work accomplished by a man in ten hours. A horse work unit is the average amount of work accomplished by a horse in ten hours. For New York conditions, an acre of the following crops represents the man and horse units indicated below. In a majority of cases the numbers which follow are based upon cost accounts. In some instances, where data were limited, the results are more or less an estimate.
| Man Units | Horse Units | Crops |
|---|---|---|
| 6 | 6 | Corn for grain husked from shock (New York method) |
| 3 | 5 | Corn for grain husked from standing stalks (Western method) |
| 5 | 6 | Corn for silage |
| 3 | 5 | Fodder corn |
| 6 | 6 | Sweet corn |
| 10 | 10 | Potatoes |
| 4 | 5 | Field beans |
| 10 | 10 | Cabbage |
| 20 | 7 | Tobacco |
| 15 | 12 | Roots (field beets, mangels, etc.) |
| 2 | 3 | Buckwheat, oats, barley, wheat, spelt, rye, field peas, and mixtures of these |
| 1 | 1 | Hay for cutting, alfalfa, clover, timothy |
| 2 | 3 | Oat hay, millet, and other grains cured for hay |
| 15 | 5 | Apples, bearing, when cared for in a commercial way |
| 3 | 1 | Apples, bearing, when little or no care is given |
| 15 | 5 | Other tree fruits, bearing |
| 2 | 1 | Fruit not of bearing age |
| 20 | 5 | Berries |
| 3 | 5 | Peas for canning factory |
| 1 | 1 | Seeds (alfalfa, clover, timothy) |
| 3 | 5 | Sorghum |
| 12 | 6 | Cotton |
| 10 to 35 | 2 to 10 | Truck crops |
For live stock listed below, the man units and horse units are as indicated.
| Man Units | Horse Units | Crops |
|---|---|---|
| 15 | 2 | Cows, ordinary dairy (majority grades) |
| 20 | 2 | Cows, pure-bred dairy (majority pure-bred) |
| 15 | 15 | To be added per cow when milk is retailed |
| 2 | 0.1 | Heifers, calves, bulls, steers, and colts when running loose |
| 2 | 0.1 | Steers or other cattle, fattened or only wintered |
| 0.5 | 0.05 | Breeding ewes and bucks (covers work on lambs) |
| 0.2 | 0.02 | Other sheep or lambs, fattened or only wintered |
| 3 | 0.05 | Brood sows (covers work on pigs till weaned) |
| 0.5 | 0.1 | Boars |
| 0.5 | 0.1 | Other hogs raised during the year |
| 0.15 | 0.02 | Hens and other poultry |
| 0.15 | 0.02 | Pullets, etc., raised during the year (covers work on cockerels) |
| 1.0 | 0.05 | Bees, per hive |
| 6 | 0.0 | Day-old chicks per 1000 |
In order to interpret the man-work-unit idea in terms of the military requirements of New York State that 16-year-, 17-year-, and 18-year-old boys are to participate in such military training or as a partial equivalent may offer farm experience or farm training, it is necessary to translate the number of hours required for such military instruction into crop values or, to use the term already understood, man work units.
Since there are 288 days or 41.1 weeks in the required military-training period (September first to the fifteenth day of June next ensuing), a boy must drill 123.3 hours. This represents on the average 12.33 man work units.
For example, if a boy grows 1.2 acres of potatoes or takes entire charge of .6 acres of berries, including cultivation, picking, marketing, etc., for a period of one year, he has spent in productive agricultural work the number of hours required for military drill.
| Man Units | Military Equivalent |
|---|---|
| 6 | 2.05 acres corn for grain husked from shock (New York method) |
| 5 | 2.46 acres corn for silage |
| 6 | 2.05 acres sweet corn |
| 10 | 1.233 acres potatoes |
| 4 | 3.08 acres field beans |
| 10 | 1.233 acres cabbage |
| 20 | .616 acres tobacco |
| 50 | .246 acres hops |
| 15 | .822 acres roots (field beets, mangels, etc.) |
| 2 | 6.16 acres buckwheat, oats, barley, wheat, spelt, rye (field peas and mixtures of these) |
| 1 | 12.33 acres hay per cutting (alfalfa, clover, timothy) |
| 2 | 6.16 acres oat hay, millet, and other grains cured for hay |
| 15 | .822 acres apples, bearing, when cared for in commercial way |
| 3 | 4.11 acres apples, bearing, when little or no care is given |
| 15 | .822 acres other tree fruits, bearing |
| 2 | 6.16 acres fruit not of bearing age |
| 20 | .616 acres berries |
| 3 | 4.11 acres peas for canning factory |
| 1 | 12.33 acres seed (alfalfa, clover, timothy) |
| 3 | 4.11 acres sorghum |
| 10 to 35 | 1.233 aces truck crops |