Now those conditions have absolutely changed. We have a condition now where, if wool growing is to continue, it must be a small farm proposition. The figures on the production of wool and of sheep in the United States will show you that the sheep raising business is going out from the West; it is going away from the South; it is going away from the large range country and is coming down to the small farm. If it is going to be a small farm proposition, sheep raising must compete with the crops which those farmers are already raising. If they are raising hogs, it must compete with hogs: if they are raising corn, it must compete with corn; if they are raising wheat, beef cattle or any other product, it must compete with those products.

I would like to show you where the population of sheep and wool population is to-day. We will take the Western States first. Here is Montana [indicating on chart]. Montana has been cut down to about one-half in the last 10 years on the number of sheep produced. Wyoming is the same way. Colorado has increased just slightly. New Mexico has been cut down to about one-half. Arizona has increased slightly. Utah has been cut down a number of thousands. Nevada is about the same as it was. Idaho has been cut down to quite an extent.

In other words, in these Western States which we have represented on the chart-and there are eight of them-there has been a decrease of 36 per cent in sheep production. Those used to be the greatest sheep States we had. They have decreased 36 per cent.

Mr. SIMS. În how long a time?

Mr. Goss. Ten years, from 1910 to 1920.-the last 10 years. Now, gentlemen, let us look at the Southern States. Here is Virginia [indicating]. Virginia has decreased slightly. West Virginia has decreased. North Carolina has decreased. South Carolina has decreased. Georgia has decreased. Florida has decreased. Alabama has increased slightly. Tennessee has decreased. Mississippi has decreased, and Louisiana has increased slightly. There has been a decrease of 5.5 per cent in the Southern States in the last 5 years, not 10 years, but 5 years.

Mr. PARKER. Did you have Kentucky there?

Mr. Goss. No, I put Kentucky in the other section. We ordinarily consider Kentucky as one of the Central West States, because in Kentucky they raise practically the same crops that we raise in Iowa, in Indiana, Ohio, and the Dakotas.

Mr. SIMS. That is out of the cotton belt?

Mr. Goss. It is; yes, sir; largely out of the cotton belt. Here are the mid-west States [indicating]. Ohio since 1910 has decreased; Indiana has decreased; illinois has increased slightly; Michigan has increased slightly; Wisconsin has decreased; Minnesota has increased, and so on down the line there. If it is necessary I will read them, but the total of the Central West States shows an increase of 4.3 per cent. You will notice that none of these States, with the exception of perhaps Ohio, Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin, produce as much as any of the Western States do. In other words, what were the big sheep-producing States are now showing a very rapid decrease and sheep-raising is coming into the States of the country where other crops have been of primary importance.

Now the Eastern States-J did not make up a chart of the Eastern States, but here are some of them. Maine has decreased over onehalf. They had 547,000, and they have gone down to 210,000 in the 10-year period. I will have to say, though, that this period is different from the previous ones in that it was from 1891 to 1909. New Hampshire during that time decreased so that it was pretty nearly one-third of what it was before; Vermont decreased so that it is about one-half. Massachusetts has decreased pretty nearly one-half: Rhode Island has decreased so it is about one-third of what it was; Connecticut has decreased considerably, showing a total decrease for practically all of the New England States.

Here is what the president of the American Woolen Co., William M. Wood, wrote to Hon. James Wilson when he was Secretary of Agriculture in 1910 in regard to the sheep industry of the Eastern States:

"We have lost one-half of our sheep in New England since 1891 and one-half of our wool production. There has been some increase in the regions farther west, but that again has not been so large as it ought to be, and there ought not to have been any reduction in New England. If, proportionately to the area there were as many sheep in New England as there are in the United Kingdom, instead of 540,500 we should now have 15,000,000 sheep grazing on our northern hills. What this would mean in the way of advantage to American manufacturing; the improvement of the land, and direct and indirect benefits to New England agriculture you can readily grasp."'

Within recent years some of the Eastern States have picked up slightly. They have a good deal the same proposition which we have out in the Central West States, they have other crops, with which sheep must compete if they are going to be raised in the Eastern States.

At the present time the United States produces only about onesixteenth of the wool which is produced; yet we use about one-fifth of the world's wool production.

Mr. SIMS. About one-fifth?

Mr. Goss. Yes, sir. I might digress here for just a moment to say also that the quality of wool has very materially increased. There is only a very small percentage of the wool at the present time which is of low quality. I understand that it is about 1 per cent. This may be due and I think it is due for I have considerable faith in the agricultural colleges to the fact that they have improved the breeds of sheep, and that they have improved the quality of wool and the amount of fleece. Figures will show that to quite an extent.

In 1903 we had the largest sheep population which we ever had. We had 64,000,000 sheep. In 1909, six years later, we had the largest wool production on a smaller number of sheep than we had in 1903, which would indicate that the quality of fleece was improving.

As I said before, if the production of wool is to continue, it must be on such a basis that it can compete with other crops. Let me cite you just two examples of what I mean by that:

You people have probably often wondered why the price of milk out in the Central West, say Des Moines and Kansas City and Chicago and some of the other cities, was nearly as high as it is in the eastern cities. The reason for that is the fact that those farmers who are producing milk have to compete with the pork and corn which are the main crops of that section. Although they are located right in the center of a favorable dairy section, the price of milk has to be sufficient so that those farmers can afford to produce milk instead of producing corn and hogs and these other main crops. When that price is not sufficient, dairying suffers.

Just another example: I showed you here the record of the Southern States. I told you that they had decreased 5.5 per cent in sheep production. Now, it may be of interest to you to know that during the five years since the beginning of the war cotton has increased 4.5 per cent; the price of wool has increased about 2.5 per cent. Mr. SIMS. You mean to 250 per cent?

Mr. Goss. About two and a half times.

Mr. SIMS. You said 2 per cent; you mean 250 per cent.

Mr. Goss. Two hundred and fifty per cent, yes. Cotton increased 450 per cent. The price of wheat, as you will see later by some of these other charts which we have, has increased about three times, or about 300 per cent, and yet the price was set on wheat and most of you people know that if that price had not been set wheat would probably have been higher than it was.

The price of pork has increased about the same, or about three times.

The price of corn has increased between twice and three times. . Mr. WINSLOW. Do you know the population of the cotton-growing area as compared with the population of the wool-growing area? Mr. Goss. You mean the farm population or the total population? Mr. WINSLOW. Well, the farm population.

Mr. Goss. I can give you the farm population and also the city population, if you wish it. Alabama has a population of 1,000,000

Mr. WINSLOW. In total, if you can give it.

Mr. Goss. I could not do that without figuring it up. We have all the States here but not the total. I can figure that for you if you wish.

My purpose in being here is not to argue the matter of increased prices for the producer, although I do not say that increased prices would not be justifiable in view of the figures which I have just given, but I do say that the prices should be stabilized to the producer. Now, to prove that point, let me show you some charts which I have prepared. The figures on which these charts are based are taken from the best authority which we have, the United States Department of Agriculture reports. Moreover, they are now history and can not be changed. They are just bare facts; take them for what they are worth.

Mr. SIMS. Before you get to that I want to ask you a question. You speak of cotton having increased 450 per cent. Did you include the seed value, the lint value, and all, or did you just simply have the price of lint cotton in mind?

Mr. Goss. That is the price of cotton as it goes from the farm. Mr. SIMS. Well, then, that is inaccurate.

Mr. Goss. To what extent, Mr. Sims?

Mr. SIMS. For instance, cotton sold this winter, good cotton, as high as 40 cents. It has been many years since it sold as low as 12 cents, and it was a good deal higher than that prior to the war, but 12 cents was a fair price for middling cotton to the farmer. Now, when it sells for 40 cents, you can see that he is not getting any 400 per cent.

Mr. Goss. Whether that is taken from, as you say, the cotton as it comes from the field or otherwise, if the same basis is taken each time, would that make any difference if it showed the same relative per cent?

Mr. SIMS. But there is a value to the cotton crop growing out of the seed which adds very materially to the value of cotton, and I didn't know but that the seed value, as well as the lint value, was included. I just wanted to know. I say I don't think it is accurate if it is based on lint value alone-on fiber value.

Mr. Goss. That was given as the farm value. To be very frank with you, I am not familiar with cotton raising. I understand, however, that includes the whole thing as it comes from the farm, both sud and lint.

Mr. SIMS. Whether it may or may not include the seed value the farmer gets it.

Mr. Goss. Yes; he gets that.

Mr. SIMS. And it may include the value of the seed.

Mr. Goss. Yes.

Mr. WINSLOW. Put it another way: Do you think the wool growers have had as good a "shake out" as the cotton growers have had in the last few years?

Mr. Goss. You say have they?

Mr. WINLOW. Yes; have they?

Mr. Goss. I wouldn't judge they had received as large returns from those figures.

Mr. WINSLOW. That is all right.

(Laughter.)

Mr. SIMS. The beauty of it is they both have done well.

Mr. Goss. They both have done better than they did before. Mr. SIMS. As all other farm products have. As the great advance in farm lands of every kind shows, farming has been a better business than it was before the advance.

Mr. Goss. Mr. Sims, when we get into that-I don't want to get off the subject here, but the value which a good many people place on returns which the farmer is getting, do not come from the products, as much as they come from the increase in farm lands. Take, for instance the farmers of the central west who went out there a number of years ago and took hold of that land; of course that land has increased in price and those farmers are pretty well off to-day, some of them, but it is due to the increase in value of the farm lands, and not to the increase in products.

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Mr. SIMS. Unless they sell their farms. They can't live on unrealized increases in farm lands.

Mr. Goss. No; it has increased credit but they have not the ready cash that is thought by many.

Mr. SIMS. They can borrow, .or something of that sort, but they can't live on it. They have got to make products to live on.

Mr. DEWALT. That certainly would not apply to the section of the country from which I come. Cattlemen there who own farms and have owned them for twenty or thirty years or more, from my personal experience are now getting for potatoes $1.50 a bushel and raising 150 bushels to the acre, and they are riding around in automobiles and enjoying their profit in many ways, and they still own their lands, the same land that they had. That was not due to the increased value of their land.

Mr. Goss. We are not talking for increased prices, as I said before. Please get that out of your minds; we are not talking here for increased prices, although, as I stated, I do not say that they would not be justifiable, but I am talking about the stability of price.

Mr. SIMS. One thing, the wool-growing industry has not increased in the period you refer to anything like all other industries have increased and in proportion to the population in the United States for that period?

Mr. Goss. No, it has not.

Mr. SIMS. In other words, it has fallen below the level of the increase of other kindred industries?

Mr. Goss. The figures which I show you on these charts, Mr. Sims, will indicate that in the last 10 years-at least 17 years-the sheep population of the country as a whole, has decreased 25 per

cent.

Mr. SIMS. Now, I think you can comment better on this than anybody else, a statement made by Mr. Rainey. He says he thinks that in Illinois the failure to increase the sheep industry and the wool-growing industry is due to the increase in the production of dogs; and there is no doubt but that there is a whole lot of truth in that.

Mr. Goss. I think there is something to it; but, Mr. Sims, if you killed every dog in the country, that would not necessarily improve

this condition.

Mr. SIMS. I think it would. The dogs kill a good many of them. Mr. Goss. Not if the farmers could not make as much from wool and from sheep as they can make from cotton or from corn or from wheat, or from beef.

Mr. SIMS. That is undoubtedly true; but unless we get some sort of a fatal dog epidemic to go through the country, it does not seem to me that according to Mr. Rainey's testimony, wool growing will become profitable if it is $5 a pound, because the dog will kill a sheep with wool at $5 a pound just as quick as he would if it was only 5 cents a pound.

Mr. Goss. Several States now have good dog laws that are improving that condition. I do not think I can give you anything more on that. It is a separate issue.

The CHAIRMAN. You were about to describe some charts there. Mr. Goss. Yes.