Remarks at a White House Luncheon for Farm Leaders.

Secretary Freeman, distinguished Members of Congress and particularly those who have dedicated their lives to the cause of agriculture, and my farmer friends and fellow Americans:

Mrs. Johnson and I are very happy that you could come to Washington and that you could meet here with us today in the White House. I hope that the exchange of information has been helpful to you and to us.

Not long ago I watched a television program on the Indian food problem. The first part of it showed how many millions of tons of wheat are being shipped to India. It took us through the Midwestern fields and their amazing mechanization. It took us to the great grain terminals. It took us through the ports in the United States and India.

Then began the long, arduous work of moving the wheat to distribution centers inland in that great country, to the villages and to the stores of the back country, and finally into the homes and stomachs of the people themselves.

The program went on to describe the state of American agriculture and Indian agriculture and the efforts that we have both made in an attempt to improve it by using better machinery, better farming techniques, better fertilizers, and better research and technical assistance.

I came away with many impressions, but uppermost was a renewed respect for the tremendous productive capacity of American agriculture.

Last night I was reading a speech that our foreign policy adviser is making in England next week. He says, in that speech, that our present population of 3 billion 400 million will increase in the next 13 years to 4 1/2 billion, and that our average production increase in the developing countries that now runs a percent per year, for the last 5 years, will have to increase more than 4 percent per year, if we are not to have famine in the world.

Those figures, those times, and those dates are just around the corner out there. So I think it is good that all segments of this great basic industry can, from time to time, forget their sections, their religions, and their politics and come together to try to think and plan and work for the future of humanity throughout the world.

For no matter what decisions are made here in Washington about the dimensions of our food for freedom program, none of those decisions are going to have any meaning, unless we have the ingenuity, unless we have the commitment, and unless, above all, we have some good luck and a lot of hard work from the American farmer.

I have been worrying ever since last August when I had my last rain down where I live.

I think the same thing is true of the programs that we are interested in that have helped us to feed and to strengthen the diets of at least 25 percent of all the people in the United States. Today, 45 million Americans benefit from the school lunch program, the special milk program, the food stamp program, and others.

Millions of poor children will be stronger and healthier in later life, because of what the basic industry does and because of these programs themselves.

Thanks to the farmer's skill, his efficiency, and his know-how the average American consumer at this moment has abundant food for his family that costs him less of his takehome pay. For instance, in 1949 he spent 25 percent of what he made to feed his family. Today, his food bill amounts to about 18 percent of his take-home pay.

Finally, the wheat and feed grains, poultry, and other products we are shipping in the world commerce are now providing this Nation a very vital part of our export earnings.

The last thing I did before coming here was spend more than an hour with the Secretary of the Treasury talking about our international monetary situation and the critical problem that lies ahead of us in our dealings with France and some of our other neighbors across the sea.

Exports of our farms produced a record of about $7 billion last year. For one industry that is so well represented in this White House room today, that is quite a record. I think it deserves the recognition that we are paying it and I think it merits the gratitude of not only the 200 million people who live in our country, but the 3 billion 400 million who live in the world.

As an American who is interested in his country's foreign policy, as one who is deeply concerned with our domestic programs, as a consumer who pays some food bills, and as a part-time, unsuccessful rancher, I want each of you to know that the representatives of this great industry are always in my thoughts and always welcome in this house.

I think I know the debt that the country owes to the farmer. I know, too, that his share in the growth and prosperity of our economy is not what it should be and not what I would like it to be.

Parity of income between the farmer and the rest of the country is the constant goal of this administration. I believe we are making some progress toward reaching it.

Despite a recent decline, farm prices are still about 4 percent higher than they were a year ago. Gross farm income in 1966 was 30 percent higher than it was in 1960. It was 18 percent higher than it was in 1963.

Net farm income was 31 percent over 1963 and per capita income of farm people has increased at a better rate than the income of others. But it is still--and this is important that we all bear in mind in every decision--two-thirds as large as that of the nonfarmer.

Farmers were still about $900 short of equality with the rest of the country last year.

I have talked about farm income throughout this Nation--in more than 30 States last year. I have talked to the Members of Congress from the farm States almost daily. I have talked with farmers themselves and those in government who are charged with improving farm income and farming conditions.

I know that farmers have been caught in a bind between higher prices, increased cost of living, higher implement prices, higher interest rates, and stable or lowering prices for their farm commodities. I do hope there are some signs of hope for a substantial improvement in this situation.

We do have some things that we think are important. We have a 4-year farm bill that the Congress has passed. We have the security that a long term program like this permits us to plan for.

With our surpluses gone already in many commodities, the market is now operating more freely than it has generally in many years. The strong world demand, both in the commercial market and in countries receiving our food aid, gives us good prospects for, we hope, improving farm income.

The marketing skill of farmers will have a lot to do with farm income. Increased efficiency will have a lot to do with it. I believe so will governmental policy in many areas, both foreign and domestic.

For my part, I can promise you that parity of income for farmers is and will be the goal of our agricultural policy. I believe there is a good future for farmers. In the past few years the outlook has grown brighter.

As one who carries a considerable responsibility for the general welfare of our whole people, I know that I want very much for it to be better--and it had better be better, for on your shoulders the well-being of millions of your brothers rests and always will.

I know of no particular industry in time of peace or war that has more nearly lived up to its responsibilities or to the expectations of the American people than the agricultural industry.

I wish that I could promise you more and deliver on those promises. I genuinely feel that at this period in our national history when last year alone we added 2,900,000 jobs, when our gross national product is at an all-time high, when we are doing more in the field of education, health, and conservation than has ever been done in our national history, that we ought to have as fine a record as we can in agriculture and I am working toward that end.

In our system of checks and balances, we have three branches. The executive proposes and the Congress disposes--and if it doesn't, the court does. It is pretty difficult to get us all three on the same wavelength at the same time.

I came here in 1931 in a period of great unrest in agricultural sections. While I don't want to ever go back to that period, I don't want to use it as a standard of measurement today, except to say that I genuinely believe that most of our dangers are from without and not from within.

I doubt that there has ever been a time when there is more patriotism, more judgment, and more cooperation evidenced between the Congress and the executive than there is now.

So in the days ahead when there will be much testing and when our trials and tribulations will bear heavily upon all of us, I want to appeal to the farm industry in advance to give us your suggestions, your ideas, your counsel, and your patience.

There is much I would like to say to you today, but I know that you have been talked to and talked out, as people always are when they come to Washington.

I am reminded of a story that Mr. Rayburn told of one time when he went back to the place where he taught school and the old part-time farmer and part-time blacksmith asked him to stay all night with him. After they had talked until midnight, the wife and daughter went to bed and the men went out on the porch and sat there until a little after 2. They then went out in the yard.

As they came back to the rock steps and porch, Mr. Rayburn said, "Listen, Lee, I am going to have to go to bed. I am going to have to make seven speeches tomorrow in my campaign."

He said, "I guess that is right, Sammy. I just been down here using the hammer and riding the cultivator and trying to keep up with you and what you are doing there in Washington and I guess you do have to go on. It is 2:30 and," he said, "this is past my bedtime. But," he said, "I just shore wish I could talk to you all night long."

When I think about what is waiting for me over in my office now, I just wish I could talk to you all night long.