. Without abundant food, alike for the armies and the peoples
now at war, the whole great enterprise upon which we have embarked will
break down and fail. The world's food reserves are low. Not only during
the present emergency but for some time after peace shall have come both
our own people and a large proportion of the people of Europe must rely
upon the harvests in America. Upon the farmers of this country,
therefore, in large measure, rests the fate of the war and the fate of
the nations. May the nation not count upon them to omit no step that
will increase the production of their land or that will bring about the
most effectual cooeperation in the sale and distribution of their
products? The time is short. It is of the most imperative importance
that everything possible be done and done immediately to make sure of
large harvests. I call upon young men and old alike and upon the
able-bodied boys of the land to accept and act upon this duty--to turn
in hosts to the farms and make certain that no pains and no labor is
lacking in this great matter.

I particularly appeal to the farmers of the South to plant abundant
food-stuffs as well as cotton. They can show their patriotism in no
better or more convincing way than by resisting the great temptation of
the present price of cotton and helping, helping upon a great scale, to
feed the nation and the peoples everywhere who are fighting for their
liberties and for our own. The variety of their crops will be the
visible measure of their comprehension of their national duty.

The Government of the United States and the governments of the several
States stand ready to cooeperate. They will do everything possible to
assist farmers in securing an adequate supply of seed, an adequate force
of laborers when they are most needed, at harvest time, and the means of
expediting shipments of fertilizers and farm machinery, as well as of
the crops themselves when harvested. The course of trade shall be as
unhampered as it is possible to make it and there shall be no
unwarranted manipulation of the nation's food supply by those who handle
it on its way to the consumer. This is our opportunity to demonstrate
the efficiency of a great Democracy and we shall not fall short of it!

This let me say to the middlemen of every sort, whether they are
handling our food-stuffs or our raw materials of manufacture or the
products of our mills and factories: The eyes of the country will be
especial