Minnesota affords a splendid illustration of this development process, and I trust that I may be pardoned for using my own State for that purpose, since I am best acquainted with her conditions, development, and resources. Of her 50,000,000 acres of land area, about one-half is actually tilled, constituting the field area of about 200,000 farms whose aggregate area, including lands not tilled, approximates 32,000,000 acres, or 160 acres each. Nearly 4,000,000 acres of her area are covered by 10,000 lakes. This vast farm area possesses a soil unsurpassed by any State or any country in the world. The great glacier of several thousand years ago was generous to Minnesota. Its fine glacial drift almost wholly covers the old rock formations. Coming from many regions and rock sources, it has given to the soil an excellent chemical composition. This, together with the vegetal mold, accumulated for ages, makes the very best of hospitable soils. The incomparable fertility of the Minnesota soil and its ability to withstand fifty years of starvation methods in cultivation is accounted for by the almost uniform mixture of vegetal mold with all kinds of decomposed rock drift, thus making it possible for less than half of the State to produce farm products aggregating the enormous total for 1909 of more than $427,000,000. (Applause) It accounts also for the fact that, while Minnesota, like all other States, during this period of fifty years has been rather mining the fertility out of her soil than cultivating it, she has withstood the consequent impoverishment without appreciable shrinkage in farm value. There is perhaps not a single representative in this distinguished assemblage who cannot recall the day when the virgin soil in his locality did not produce from 50 to 100 percent larger crops than it does today, when dense forests covered large tracts now a barren waste, and when the bosom of the earth contained untold millions of mineral wealth now represented on the surface by huge spoil-banks and sunken surfaces. We remember only too well when our fertile fields yielded thirty-five to forty bushels of wheat to the acre, and that the same fields produced only about twelve bushels five years ago. In nearly every community there is found that pathetic omen of decay, the deserted farm—even in this young State.
The economic importance of soil conservation is so great that it can scarcely be estimated. In making my estimates I have taken a very conservative view, and while no absolutely accurate figures can be obtained, the few that I shall give will be found sufficiently reliable to establish the paramount value of soil conservation.
In Minnesota the low tide of soil impoverishment occurred about five years ago. At that time, after several years of apparently unsuccessful effort, the Agricultural College and schools, assisted by the State Farmers' Institutes and the press, succeeded in stemming the tide and arousing considerable interest in new methods of farming along more intelligent and intensive lines. Only within the last year, however, has progress been marked and rapid. When the first State Conservation Congress was called to meet in Saint Paul, March, 1909, nearly every township in the State was represented and all but two counties presented agricultural and industrial exhibits, attracting a total attendance of more than 150,000 people. The wonderful success of that Congress and the enthusiasm it stirred up all over the State gave a great impetus to this new era of agricultural reform in the entire Northwest and insured the complete success of this Congress from a local standpoint. Never before had 6,000 of the most progressive farmers of a State met for the purpose of discussing more intelligent methods of farming, as well as the suppression of wasteful methods in all fields of agricultural and industrial activity.
During the past short period of five years the average cereal yield of this State has been increased more than five bushels per acre; the corn belt has been extended northward more than 300 miles to the Canadian boundary by the production of hardy and early maturing varieties of corn, yielding the State last year over 60,000,000 bushels, and placing Minnesota among the dozen leading corn States of the Union. It is estimated that plant breeding and seed selection alone last year added about $15,000,000 to our agricultural products. The cereal production has also affected clover, timothy and other tame grasses, thus largely contributing to the growth of the dairy industry, which has been increased ten-fold in twenty years until it now yields the State $50,000,000 annually, several counties netting more than $1,000,000 each. Similar progress has been made in the live stock, fruit, and truck gardening industries, and it is safe to conclude that Minnesota has entered in earnest upon a complete plan of agricultural reconstruction.
But let us consider the opportunities for advancement that are still open, in order that we may determine the economy of soil conservation in terms of dollars and cents. The average yield of Minnesota wheat last season was seventeen bushels per acre. At the agricultural experiment stations the same wheat with improved seed selection and better preparation of soil by crop rotation and tillage yielded twenty-eight bushels per acre, climatic and soil conditions, as well as expense of tillage being otherwise similar, a difference in favor of intelligent farming approximating from five to eight dollars per acre, depending on local conditions. Assuming for the sake of argument that the average difference in the State would not be more than four dollars per acre, it would still increase the agricultural net earning of the State on the basis of the present acreage $100,000,000 annually. These figures do not take into consideration the further increase of soil productivity by various methods of fertilization other than those resulting from planting crops which enrich the soil with nitrogen, phosphoric acid, potash and calcium, the essential elements of plant growth. Besides, I have not attempted to estimate the value of raising almost maximum yields, where weather conditions are unfavorable, by such drainage, preparation of soil, planting and tillage as will best suit local and climatic conditions. No crop emphasizes the value of seed selection in such unmistakable terms as corn. The average stand of this crop does not exceed 60 percent, which means that the farmer spends 40 percent of his time in the cornfield without result. By selecting the seed in the field at the proper season, testing each ear before planting, and separating with reference to size, so that as nearly as possible the planter will put three kernels in each hill, the stand can be increased to at least 95 percent. Applying this increase to the 2,000,000 acres of cornfield in Minnesota, it would add approximately 30,000,000 bushels with practically no additional cost of production. That the importance of this matter might be more firmly impressed upon the people of the State, I have issued a seed-corn proclamation designating the time when the seed-corn should be selected and calling the attention of the people to the feed value of the corn product as well as corn fodder, which is of utmost importance in a dry season like the one we are now experiencing. This proclamation has received extensive publicity, and it is safe to say that a large number of Minnesota's 200,000 farmers will heed the note of warning.
Of still more vital importance, if possible, is the maintenance and increase of soil fertility as a source of support for future generations. The soil is the only permanent asset of the farmer, and its net returns in crops constitute his annual dividends. Any impairment of this asset will not only reduce the dividends on which his support depends, but will destroy the productive power of the soil to such extent as to deprive future owners of the most essential means of livelihood. A loss of $1,000,000,000 in farm values, such as the older States have already suffered, does not mean merely that this vast sum of money has been wasted, but that its annual earning capacity on which thousands should depend for support has been entirely destroyed, and that these thousands have been forced to seek their sustenance from the fields of commerce and manufacture in the large cities. We enact stringent legislation to prevent the impairment of capital in our banking institutions to protect depositors from loss, but the working capital investment of millions in farm property on which all human institutions must necessarily depend for existence has not been safeguarded in any manner whatsoever. Without any organized effort to interfere, we still permit millions of farmers to mine out the fertility of the soil, thus increasing the drudgery of farm life, reducing every source of farm income, converting the producers of the farm into consumers of the city, and thus contributing directly to the great increase in cost of living, the scarcity of farm labor, and the congested conditions that breed disease and crime in our large cities. Apply the situation to the country at large and you will find a situation that is simply appalling. There are approximately 500,000,000 acres under actual tillage in the United States. Instead of figuring four dollars per acre waste, which probably would be a fair average, we will place the loss at the extremely low estimate of one dollar. This will still make the total loss through wasteful farming methods in the United States reach the enormous total of $500,000,000 annually. In other words, if the loss were in fact not greater than one dollar per acre, which is unquestionably too low, and that rate could be maintained perpetually without an ultimate depletion of the soil, it would mean that a capital investment of $12,500,000,000 with an earning capacity of four percent per annum aggregating $500,000,000 annually, had been completely destroyed.
At the rate of two dollars per acre, which is a low average, we are every year wasting the income from $25,000,000,000, a sum so great as to be entirely beyond human comprehension. In many of the older States, where farms were sold forty years ago at $150 per acre, the same farms cannot be sold today for $25 per acre, sometimes less than the actual cash value of the buildings and other improvements, because the soil has been robbed of its fertility, making it impossible for the owner to earn the most meager living without restoring the vitality of the soil through expensive methods of fertilization.
It is not at all difficult to see how such wasteful methods of farming must affect the entire industrial situation. The younger generation, inspired with the hopes, aspirations, and energy of youth, stirred by the achievements, opportunities, and general prosperity of a truly great Nation, and encouraged by the possibilities of a liberal education, cannot afford to stake its future on the eking out of a mere existence under the shadow of a rapidly increasing farm mortgage or the threatening omen of a deserted homestead. All honor and credit to that farmer's boy who early realizes the handicap placed upon him by the impairment, and oftentimes utter destruction, of the only safe capital investment of the farmer—fertile and productive soil. Should we complain because he goes to the city to seek more inviting and attractive fields of existence after having been robbed of his only means of livelihood on the farm? This is the proper time for us to think it over. In the younger States, where soil mining has been of such short duration as to be incomplete, and the value of the land through settlement, city growth, and increased transportation facilities is constantly growing, the young man, who has learned intelligent and progressive methods of farming, should have no fear as to the future, for he has the making of a safe investment; but the young lad who, without experience or training, unexpectedly finds himself possessor of a farm where land values have ceased to rise and the soil has been starved until it no longer can yield in abundance, has a white elephant on his hands, and the sooner he can be brought to the realization thereof the better for himself and the entire community.
Where a certain amount of labor should produce thirty bushels of wheat to the acre, it yields but ten, or even less; and when the farmer cultivates his corn, working ten hours per day, four hours thereof is spent in vain, because 40 percent of the field has no corn—not to speak of the poor quality of the corn grown on account of defective preparation of soil, poor tillage, and the lack of necessary nutritive elements within the soil itself. In addition, he has no knowledge as to diversified farming, the value of live stock, dairying, fruit-raising, truck-gardening, and many other means of livelihood which yield large incomes to the possessor of a well-managed farm, nor does he appreciate the enormous waste committed by unnecessary exposure to the elements of farm machinery and buildings.
The young lady faces a similar situation. Every field of employment bids her welcome at wages from $50 or more per month, and she has already achieved such abundant success in every line of human enterprise, and at the same time enjoyed all the pleasures and delights which bring cheer to the heart of the young, that she cannot afford to even hesitate. Should we complain if she refuses to stay on the farm and take her chances of marrying a $25 man and a ruined farm plastered all over with mortgages, and be chained in matrimonial bonds of lifelong drudgery to a devastated farm homestead, robbed of everything that contributes to the beautiful and good and true in a woman's life? (Great applause) There is only one answer, and its conclusions are just.