Bismarck Daily Tribune

UNION TO ENCOURAGE EXPERIMENT STATIONS.

Referring to the bill recently introduced in congress by Representative Adams of Wisconsin, doubling the federal appropriation for agricultural experiment stations, the Breeders' Gazette says:

"It ought to become a law. Under the present statute, enacted when these institutions were established, the sum appropriated to each station is $15,000 annually. This is the mere pittance with which most of the stations have been conducting operations for about fifteen years. Convinced that the investment would yield large returns some of the more progressive agricultural states have come to the aid of their respective experiment stations with substantial appropriations, but public opinion seems to indicate in a large majority of the states that the government subsidy is ample for the needs of these handicapped institutions. It unfortunately is true that some of the states which manifest the least concern in their agricultural development are those which most need the educational stimulus provided by properly supported experiment stations.

"Without larger funds than they now receive it is impossible for the $15,000-a-year stations to undertake the extensive investigative work which invites them in every field. About all they can do is to maintain an organization, issue occasional bulletins giving analyses of foodstuffs and fertilizers, and conduct inexpensive experiments on a small scale. With such scant funds they cannot begin to grapple with those complex problems on the solution of which agricultural prosperity depends. Experimental work is expensive, but rightly directed it always more than pays for itself in the long run."