And we began manufacturing in our country at the time we began robbing our soil. The last half-century we have built up our manufactories at an astonishing rate. Why have we built them up so fast; why have they risen to such tremendous figures? Because our people were fed cheaper and better than the people who worked in factories in any other country. But what is the condition now? Are our people still better fed and more cheaply that work in the factories, that work for the railroads, that work in the mines? No! There is where the trouble comes; that is what has arrested the attention of our people. Every year, maybe oftener (Mr Hill could tell better than I can), the men that work for railroads notify the president that they want more wages because they can't live; and of course he has to raise their wages. While we were feeding Europe, there was no difficulty in getting cheap food here in the United States for our workingmen; but, as Mr Hill told you, and gave you statistics for it--it is pretty hard to follow a man like him, who has all the statistics, and Dr Wallace, who has all the philosophy and wit, but I will do the best I can (laughter)--we are sending less and less food to foreign countries and paying more and more for what our workingmen eat at home. We are not paying off debts any more, though our people are still buying diamonds and pearls--you see the rows we are having in New York when our traveling Americans come back, and want to get their jewels through the custom-house for nothing and hide them and all that; I have no sympathy with it--but we are not discussing the tariff here at all; I never talk politics and won't allow it; I have 12,000 men in my Department and every man knows I'll discharge him in a minute if he talks politics (laughter and applause); we are considering the natural resources of the country and trying to conserve them. (Applause and cries of "Good!")
As the Department grew we organized a bureau for animals, another for plants, one for forests, one for chemistry, and one for soils; and all along the line we have those great bureaus at work. We are the practical fellows who conserve; we are doing it every day. I have just been out among the forests myself four or five weeks, helping to save the Government's property out there. But the great question comes down to the soil. There is no classical college or university that teaches anything about the soil, not one single thing. From the time that Samuel had the school of the prophets at Bethel down to the present day, there never has been anything taught to the people with regard to the soil on which they walk and from which they get their living. I have organized a bureau for it. We are studying the soil all over the country. You might think, to go out on these beautiful prairies, that the soil is all alike. Well, it isn't; any prairie has probably a hundred different soils, some of them best adapted to grow one plant and some another, some needing one kind of treatment and some another; and the great fundamental question that we must study now is the American soil and its power to produce. (Applause)