WHY I AM RUNNING

An Abilene paper stated that a farmer in Erath County, who had never been mentioned for congress, had joined the race. It is so. I had never been mentioned. No one on earth knew I was going to run, not even myself.

I went to bed one night after hearing the price of cattle had gone down, hogs had taken a tumble, chickens had gone down, eggs had gone down, the farmers had been weedled out of their peanuts, and then I heard that another judge had announced for Congress. The third one! And I said to myself, "Why on earth don’t farmers assert themselves?" I never heard of a farmer Congressman from Texas. Why doesn’t some farmer run? We farmers have been electing other professions always and the only thing we ever get out of it is a greeting card for Johnnnie or Susan at graduation time. Oh yes, we are told how smart and patriotic we are. We are always drowned in soft soap. As a matter of fact, we are not smart. If we were we would demand our rights so we could lay up a penny or two for a rainy day while others are making millions.

I may not get elected, but even if I am not, I want to act kinder as a heel fly and keep the judges out of the shade and running when the weather gets hot. We farmers are used to hot weather. Come to think of it, I know a lot more about heel flies than I do about politics. Just the same, I can learn.

You may want to know who I am. Well, I came to Erath County quite a while ago and when I got here I didn’t have a shirt on my back or a nickel in my pocket. They told me afterward that I weighed nine pounds when I got here. I was very near born between two cotton rows. My father was an old Irish peddler who walked from Mississippi and peddled his way as he came. My mother was raised in Georgia in the wake of Sherman’s march to the sea. You could not tell her anything about war. I do not claim any credit for my boyhood days. I just grew up as that seemed the handiest thing to do.

The judges will try to sell you themselves. I am going to try to sell the people new ideas. I know that I will be at a disadvantage in this race. I am not as handsome as the judges—never went to a beauty parlor in my life. I am not much at public speaking, so the only way I can beat the judges is to out-think them. Ideas do not appeal to some like sentiment does. But a man can’t work, after eating a boggy-topped custard, as well as he can after eating a piece of cornbread. The custard has the sentiment.

And now I want to say this, I may make a little fun of my opponents, but you bet your life I am not going to say anything serious about them. If I know anything bad on either one of them, I would not tell it. So come on, gentlemen, dry your tears and lets have some fun along our race. Don’t get the idea that I am against any profession. We are all in the same boat and trying to do the best we know how. I think it is time for us farmers to rear up on our feet. If there was a farmer running for congress in every district, we would be better off. If I can start something like that I will not have run in vain, even if the judges walk my log.

Some people may say it is too serious a time to be laughing, but you can laugh a wart off your nose as easily as you can cry it off and a man laughing looks better. Out at Fitzgerald’s Nursery we have trees that seem to laugh at drought—no matter what happens, they laugh. We have others that fold up and die if things go bad with them.