Speech #630138207

Moreover this agriculture such -as it is. finds its roots in prehistoric times. There is no present movenent of population into these countries. but on.the contrary a steady outward flow. largely into the United States. As far back as history goes. we find the pressure of local conditions inducing emigration from Scandinavia. Knowing nothing of fairer climes. fancying that all the world was as forbidding as their native land. ignorant of life under other conditions of greater opportunity than prevailed at home. their first colonies were established in the northern latitudes. Iceland was settled from Norway. Later. as the sagas of Iceland inform us. emigrants from that country established themselves in Greenland. and maintained a flourishing colony in that forbidding environment during a long period of time. But these migrations have ceased. The colony in Greenland is only a memory. The glories of Iceland have vanished. With increasing knowledge. the flow of emigration has turned in other directions. No mileage of railroads in Greenland. or Iceland. or northern Scandinavia would attract colonists and settlers to those countries. The world is wiser now than it was in the days of the Vikings. and there is no movement of population toward Greenland. though lower Greenland is in the latitude of Fairbanks. And yet the advocates of this Alaskan proposition. with full knowledge that even an emigrant from Iceland. or Norway. or Finland. or Sweden. leaving as he would. a settled country. with homes and schools and civilization. could not hope to better his condition as an agricultural pioneer in the bleak interior of Alaska. Insist that if we build railroads into that country. a great flow of emigration would set thitherward. Whence would it come? Surely there is no farmer in any State of this Union. living under conditions so untoward. or unhappy. that he would be attracted to a country where the soil is frozen everywhere to bedrock. and land selected for agriculture must be cleared for such limited crops as may be raised. at an expense of from $125 to $200 an acre.