The Rural Life Problem of the United States: Notes of an Irish ObserverPlunkett, Horace Curzon, Sir
History
The Rural Life Problem of the United States: Notes of an Irish Observer
Plunkett, Horace Curzon, Sir
Farm life; Natural resources
These differences will have to be taken into account in considering the
important question of ways and means. Both bodies will, I hope, appeal
successfully to public-spirited philanthropists. The temporary body will
need only temporary support; perhaps provision for a five-years'
campaign would suffice. In the near future, local organisations would
naturally defray the cost of the services rendered to them by the
central body; but the Country Life Institute would need a permanent
endowment. The man fitted for its chief control will not be found idle,
but will have to be taken from other work. The scheme, as I have worked
it out, will involve prolonged economic and social inquiry over a wide
field. This would be conducted mostly by postgraduate students. From
those who did this outside work with credit would be recruited the
small staff which would be needed at the central office to get into the
most accessible form the facts and opinions which are needed for the
guidance of those who are doing practical work in the field of rural
regeneration. My estimate of the amount required to do the work well is
from forty to fifty thousand dollars a year, or say a capital sum of
from a million to a million and a quarter dollars. Whether the project
is worthy of such an expenditure, depends upon the question whether I
have made good my case.
Let me summarise this case. I have tried to show that modern
civilisation is one-sided to a dangerous degree--that it has
concentrated itself in the towns and left the country derelict. This
tendency is peculiar to the English-speaking communities, where the
great industrial movement has had as its consequence the rural problem I
have examined. If the townward tendency cannot be checked, it will
ultimately bring about the decay of the towns themselves, and of our
whole civilisation, for the towns draw their supply of population from
the country. Moreover, the waste of natural resources, and possibly the
alarming increase in the price of food, which have lately attracted so
much attention in America, are largely due to the fact that those who
cultivate the land do not intend to spend their lives upon it; and
without a rehabilitation of country life there can be no success for the
Conservation policy. Therefore, the Country Life movement deals with
what is probably the most important problem before the English-speaking
peoples at this time. Now the predominance of the towns which is
depressing the country is based partly on a fuller application of modern
physical science, partly on superior business organisation, partly on
facilities for occupation and amusement; and if the balance is to be
redressed, the country must be improved in all three ways. There must be
better farming, better business, and better living. These three are
equally necessary, but better business must come first. For farmers, the
way to better living is coöperation, and what coöperation means is the
chief thing the American farmer has to learn.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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