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Two-price systems would be very difficult to administer and very expensive. Export subsidies hold some promise but are not satisfactory based upon experience with the wheat program.

The various soil fertility bank proposals might well be refined into one program that could conceivably be extremely helpful. In this area where our major cash crops are export crops, cotton and tobacco, such a soil fertility bank program might well serve the purpose of affording some degree of supplemental income to farmers to compensate for the loss in income by reason of reduced acreages in allotment crops. Obviously no such program could be developed that would be a satisfactory substitute for existing price-support programs but might well be considered on the basis of being a supplemental program. Another very important feature of this kind of soil fertility bank program would be to take diverted acres out of production and not aggravate the situation by continuing to pile up surpluses in other crops from which there are no acres diverted and which do not enjoy the privilege of support price. The costs of this kind of a program are as yet, of course, undetermined; but even what might appear to be a very high cost may well prove to be cheap if it accomplishes the purpose of avoiding an overall eventual depression which we could ill afford in the light of the present high tax income required to support our governmental services and programs. There is nothing to indicate that such high level governmental expenditures are to be substantially reduced in the near future.

There is much misunderstanding abroad in the land, particularly on the part of farm people, with respect to provisions of present law. There is no such thing as a high rigid support price although certain references often made to provisions of existing law which provide for 90 percent of parity support prices under certain conditions are often referred to as such. The flexible, or so-called flexible, support-price provision of present law is something that is often fixed in the mind of the average southern farmer as providing no more and no less than 75 percent of parity support price. Actually. existing law provides 90 percent support price for basic commodities when supply is kept reasonably in line with demand for the product. The level of support price would be decreased according to the percentage of oversupply above a normal supply--except as in the case of tobacco where growers fail to vote quotas upon themselves then there is no support price, and in the case of other basics where the support price becomes 50 percent of parity when growers disapprove marketing quotas.

Our farm people want no more than belongs to them. When one group or segment of our economy gets more than it earns, then another group or segment gets less than it earns. Apparently the American farmer of today is not getting all his earned income. To correct this situation would be a most difficult task if viewed in the light of agriculture alone as related to the national economy. It may be well nigh impossible as a matter of practical politics, and political considerations cannot possibly be eliminated in the coming session of Congress. It is not possible to foretell all the various proposals that Congress will be called upon to consider as parts of an overall program to lift agriculture in this country to its proper position. Therefore, our appeal to you is to give very serious consideration to every proposal. That you be sure that you do not put your stamp of approval upon any proposal that is against the agricultural interest or the public interest of this country.

The farmers of this country owe to the Congress a great debt of gratitude for many pieces of constructive and helpful farm legislation enacted during the past 20 years. The Congress is by no means responsible for all the difficulties in which farmers find themselves today, and the Congress is not altogether responsible for the total solution of all the major farm problems of today. In some instances, a more sympathetic and understanding administration of the farm program laws could have more nearly carried out the intent and purpose of the law.

Farmers themselves have a major responsibility in this connection. In some instances, you provide the machinery for the farmer to use for self-help-like the provisions for holding referendums on marketing quota acreage allotment programs. Your attention is respectfully called to the fact that South Carolina farmers have always come through with heavy favorable votes in such referendums. This is clear evidence of the fact that our farmers do believe in the adjustment principle, that they are quite willing to make the necessary adjustments in production to justify a continued 90 percent of parity support price, and that they will and do make right decisions if given full information and an opportunity to express themselves.

As to the responsibility that the Congress bears for agriculture's plight today, it isn't that you haven't been very kind, considerate and helpful to agriculture; but that you have been in some instances more kind, considerate and helpful to other groups-witness the result of the recent minimum wage legislation increasing from 75 cents to $1 an hour the legal minimum. Although this action was fully justifiable in the light of increased costs of living, it did levy a rather severe penalty on agriculture by reason of the fact that the results of the round of wage increases have already served, even before the law becomes effective, to tighten the squeeze in which farmers live today by tending to lower the price of everything that he has to sell and increasing the cost of everything he has to buy. We are not complaining about the minimum wage increase. We farmers like for our off-the-farm friends to have full employment at good wages so that we can find a ready market for our products.

No

What we are asking is that you do something comparably good for us. one single thing can possibly accomplish the purpose. It must be a combination of things to encourage expanded market outlets and new uses for farm products at home and abroad. We feel confident that you gentlemen of this committee have already distinguished yourselves through your efforts to be of constructive assistance to agriculture, and we hope that you are successful in prevailing upon your colleagues to go along with you in the development, the refining, and the implementation of a farm legislative program that will do all the multiple problems of agriculture. Increased foreign sales of agricultural agriculture to obtain more nearly its rightful share of the national income.

Obviously, acreage-control and support-price legislation is not the answer to all the multiple problems of agriculture. Increased foreign sales of agricultural products under the law providing for sales of such products for foreign currency is helpful. Successful domestic sales-promotion programs for meats, fruits, vegetables, and milk have been found helpful, too.

The squeeze in which farmers find themselves must be worked on from both ends. Efficient low-cost production and distribution are vital to farm prosperity. The major factor in both is the cost of labor.

On the other end, research and education to encourage the production of products of high quality that the consumer wants is a major approach to the solution of the problem of the farmer getting more of the consumers' dollar.

To put all the emphasis on the level of support price would be equivalent to defending the fort from one side when it is being attacked from four sides. While support prices have been most helpful, we have demonstrated that support price alone does not guarantee farm prosperity. While South Carolina farmers subscribe heartily to 90 percent of parity support prices and the adjustment principle, they also are very conscious of the need for additional income. We believe in holding the line on 90 percent support prices under present provisions of law while we join you in working diligently for the expansion of foreign and domestic markets and the finding of new uses for our farm products. We realize fully that we cannot produce for domestic consumption alone and ever expect to again have farm prosperity.

Our export crops are the ones in most serious trouble. The trouble did not stem for the most part, as claimed by many, from high support prices, but rather from the effects of our foreign aid and trade programs that have contributed largely to the loss of export markets for American agricultural products. So it is by indirection as well as direction that we must look with hope to some solution of agriculture's problems.

We feel that it is the primary responsibility of this committee and the House Agriculture Committee to keep the Congress well informed as to the prospective effects of all proposed national legislation with regard to its probable impact on agriculture. In other words, our appeal to you is for the same kind of considerate treatment for agriculture in the future that business, industry, and labor have received in the recent past. Under this kind of treatment for agriculture, and with accelerated programs of sales promotion and self-help on the part of farmers themselves, we farmers could face the future with confidence.

64440-56-pt. 6- -11

STATEMENT OF ED B. BASKIN, PRESIDENT, STATE ASSOCIATION OF SOIL CONSERVATION DISTRICT SUPERVISORS, BISHOPVILLE, S. C.

Mr. BASKIN. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, I would like first to take this opportunity to welcome you to South Carolina to hear the problems of the South Carolina farmer. I would like to say at the outset that I have been following your hearings for some time. I appreciated the fact that you gentlemen went into Wisconsin, Iowa, and other parts of our Nation to hear the problems of farmers of other sections.

I see that I have made somewhat of a mistake in appearing here as a representative of a group.

The CHAIRMAN. What is your occupation?

Mr. AGNEW. I am a farmer.

The CHAIRMAN. Let's get your farming views now.

Mr. BASKIN. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. You are here for soil conservation?

Mr. BASKIN. I would like to say to begin with, sir, that I thought in order to appear here it would be preferable that I appear as a representative of the group of which I am president. However, as you will see in my statement, I devote 1 page to the thinking of that group and 4 pages to my own personal opinion. This statement is prepared by me personally and individually.

The CHAIRMAN. The statement will be put in the record as though you presented it, sir. Suppose you highlight it and give us the views have as a farmer.

you

Mr. BASKIN. That I would like to do.

I would like to begin first by saying this: We as a soil-conservation group, and this is a brief summary, would like to express our appreciation to the loyal support which was expressed for the soil-conservation work this past year when in spite of the fact that the administration recommended that our funds be drastically reduced, you gave us a considerable increase in our appropriation.

I think that that is ample testimony to the fact that you appreciate the work we as independent unpaid farmers are doing.

I would like also to commend

The CHAIRMAN. I wish to say this to complete the picture: I am chairman of the Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, but my good friend to my right here is also on that committee and I should drop dead today he would be its chairman. He is also, as I am, on the Appropriations Subcommittee that provides these funds and if it had been left to us you would have gotten more than you got.

Mr. BASKIN. I can endorse that myself because I had written commitments from both before it ever came up they would support us a hundred percent.

The CHAIRMAN. Let's not forget Senator Russell, because he is the chairman.

Mr. BASKIN. We are appreciative of Senator Russell.

The CHAIRMAN. I do not mean to say that other Senators here like my good friend over here, Senator Scott, did not do as well as we did, but the thing is they don't sit on the Appropriations Committee, which is the one that made these recommendations, and where the real

fight was put on. The others have voted down the line. Senator Thurmond made a speech on that on the floor of the Senate.

Senator THURMOND. That is where the fight was to a great extent. The CHAIRMAN. You would agree that the Appropriations Committee's coming out with it helped a bit?

Senator THURMOND. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. That helped quite a bit. We are all in the same boat in trying to help now. The only reason I mentioned myself and Senator Johnston is because we were on the committee there that held the hearings, and were instrumental in getting the facts before the whole Senate through the hearings that made it possible to get all this money.

Mr. BASKIN. The next point I would like to cover is the recent law passed, Public Law 550, which deals with our small watersheds. We would like to say we have one pilot project operating in this State and it has worked with great success. We think it should be the model for your future plans for controlling water because water must be controlled where it falls.

The recent floods in New England are ample demonstration of the fact that once the water gets into major streams there is no big dam that will control the floods of our mighty rivers. We think this law should be improved. It is vastly encumbered with redtape. It takes several years to even begin to get the project rolling under the new law. We think there should be provision for the Federal Government to bear a large share of the dam, the cost of dams which benefit large groups. Now, there is very small provision for the Federal Government to bear the cost of these dams which benefit large groups and of course you can't persuade a small group of farmers, the law right now deals primarily with the farmer above the dam, but very often even the city below the dam will benefit as much or more than the farmers from whose farms the water is collected.

We like the law but those two things, abandonment of redtape and larger share of Federal funds on larger dams that have wide beneficial results would improve the law.

The CHAIRMAN. As I understand it, the Federal Government pays all the costs.

Mr. BASKIN. No, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Yes, it does. I am chairman of the Public Works Committee and I think I know what I am talking about. I am referring to the big dams.

Mr. BASKIN. I am talking about the small dams that collect water back at the streamhead, and not on rivers and streams. I mean your small watershed projects.

The CHAIRMAN. Watersheds like in Pickens County?

Mr. BASKIN. Six Mile Creek,

The CHAIRMAN. The bottom lands that were flooded and you could not grow corn. Below the dam projects as much as above the dam. Mr. BASKIN. Yes. There are thousands of acres below those dams in Pickens County that will benefit as many or more than the farmers above the dam.

Now, gentlemen, that completes my statement with reference to the soil-conservation problem, and if you will bear with me I would like to go through, I can summarize but I think it is pretty well summarized already.

The CHAIRMAN. I wonder if you would be good enough to do this: You have heard the testimony this morning and we have asked quite a few questions. Have you anything new to add to what you have heard this morning?

Mr. BASKIN. Yes, sir; I have. I have seven specific recommendations.

The CHAIRMAN. Are they entirely new to what you have heard this morning?

Mr. BASKIN. Not entirely new, but I am here as a dirt farmer and I would like to make them and I don't intend to impose on your time. The CHAIRMAN. That is all right. We will stay here as long as you have something new to offer.

Mr. BASKIN. I will summarize, then, sir. I would like to say that I have been farming 10 years. I came out of the Army in 1945. I farmed 600 acres of land. This 600 acres of land was formerly in 4 farms. Those 4 farms at one time grew over 400 acres of cotton. Today the allotment on the 4 farms is down to 140 acres and I believe we face a 10- or 12-percent additional cut which I am willing to take, I want to point that out. On these farms at one time there were more than 20 families and I would say at that time those families averaged as many as 10 people per family.

Today with the present cotton allotment we are down to five families. We have mechanized, don't have a mule on the 600 acres that used to be considered approximately a 25-horse farm. I want to point out that the farmers of South Carolina have never failed to vote overwhelmingly to place acreage controls on both cotton and tobacco.

I would like to substantiate the statements made earlier today that we are not only willing but we are anxious at all times to control ourselves to the very maximum extent that will bring our production in line with the produce that is required by our Nation. I am not one of those who supports a two-price system because I don't believe that we farmers here in America in competing with $1-an-hour minimum wages, I am not opposed to a dollar-an-hour minimum, I would like to approach that on behalf of the farmers of South Carolina, I don't believe in other part of our crop we will be able to compete successfully in the national market for cotton or tobacco. We will be competing with labor that is almost in peonage and I don't believe it would be a wise idea for the farmers of these United States to attempt to compete.

I would like to say this: I think that the fundamental thing wrong with agriculture today is that we have as our Secretary of Agriculture, and, incidentally, I want to point out so you will not get the idea I am getting into partisan politics, I was one of those gullibles who accepted the promise of 100 percent of parity made at Kasson in 1952 and persuaded our farmers we were going to get a hundred percent. With the result 2 years later we are down to 75 percent and less. The farmers are in a drastic situation in South Carolina. We are almost back to a situation that will make 1932 and 1933 look like a picnic if something isn't done quickly, but instead of that we have a Secretary of Agriculture who is very fine, a religious man, I believe, and an apostle of the Mormon Church, but whose fundamental philosophy is completely, utterly and entirely out of step with the needs of the farmer today.

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