Remarks to the National 4-H Conference.

I COULD USE a lot of you up on my farm right now, as you know that we are trying to get it into order and shape.

We talk about farm problems. We talk about farm products. And you have heard often of the importance of the farm economy to the entire national economy. You have heard about the importance of this crop and that crop and what it means in national income.

As I see so many young people, I am tempted to talk for just a moment about the most important crop of all in this country: yourselves.

You produce the future producers of our agricultural supplies of all kinds, and you send to the city annually some one-half of your entire personnel. These cities get their infusion of new blood from our agricultural regions. The point that I should like to make is that I believe you have more than an ordinarily good opportunity to prepare yourselves well for leadership in the future activities of our country.

As a farm individual, you are first close to the soil and from the soil must come all the things by which we live. You are a business person. You have to be a professional person if you are going to farm correctly--at least the scientists are scaring me to death about the things I don't know about my farm. And you must be a working man, you must be able to take care of the things that you do in order to produce a good cow, or calf, or a crop of corn, or wheat, or cotton--whatever. So you are gaining, in the practical way, an all-round experience of the problems of the various classifications of our citizenship, as you are gaining likewise an understanding of our whole economy and where the agricultural economy fits into it. In this whole effort I think that membership of the 4-H Clubs with their stress upon citizenship-becoming good citizens, good leaders--is probably one of the greatest products that our agricultural regions are giving us today--I am sure of it.

I wish that I could have a few minutes with each of you, to try to tell you what I believe is in front of you, not in terms of the commencement speaker, who labors in very measured, solemn tones to paint the horrible side of the future and the challenges in front of you, but just to talk a little bit about some of the things I believe maybe I have learned, and how much I envy you what is in front of you--to stop and think of the things you are going to see. It is so fascinating that we could stand here for the rest of the day talking about them. In this great and fast-changing world, you are not only going to participate, you are going to be leaders--on the farms and in the cities. You are going to influence others, and you are learning today in the best possible way through these 4-H endeavors and these 4-H Clubs how to do it well.

I think the only real thought I want to leave with you is this: I congratulate you heartily both on when you were born, what you have done, and what you are going to do.

Thank you a lot, and goodby.