Local legislator focuses on agriculture, farmers
By Steve Herring
Published in News on April 11, 2017 10:12 AM
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News-Argus/STEVE HERRING
State Rep. Jimmy Dixon answers questions about agriculture Monday afternoon following his comments at a meeting at the John Locke Foundation in downtown Raleigh. Dixon said farmers are over-regulated and unfairly targeted by the "liberal media" and others.
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News-Argus/STEVE HERRING
State Rep. Jimmy Dixon quotes President Abraham Lincoln, who said farmers make two from where there was once just one. Dixon spoke at a noon meeting Monday at the John Locke Foundation in downtown Raleigh.
RALEIGH -- Farmers are overburdened by regulations and besieged by the "liberal media" and others who do not understand agriculture's importance to the county's growth and survival, Rep. Jimmy Dixon said.
Government and regulations are among the biggest challenges facing farmers and any other business group, and when government moves the goal line it is very difficult for farmers to deal with, he said.
That is why, whenever possible, that a "measured priority" must be afforded agriculture by government an industry, Dixon told those attending a noon program at the conservative John Locke Foundation in downtown Raleigh.
Today, agriculture must mediate between nature and the human community with ties and obligations in both directions, said Dixon, a Mount Olive farmer and Republican who represents the state's 4th House District.
Serious challenges are facing farmers today including special interest groups who may know just enough about the reality of farming to think that Cheerios are doughnut seeds, he said.
Those groups use words like sustainability while attacking tried and true farming methods that continue to allow farmers to produce quality and affordable food, Dixon said.
And farmers are doing so on less land, with fewer farmers, under more regulations and under increasing difficult weather situations, he said.
"These people who are enemies to agriculture, their plows, combines, cultivators and work boots are nothing more than their pens and keyboards a thousand miles from any farm where they spew out their misguided opinions through the liberal media and social media sites while having their stomachs comfortably full with high quality food at a very economic cost," Dixon said.
It is food produced by dedicated farmers, and it is important that people never stop in thinking that food does not come from the grocery store, he said.
Rather it comes from the efforts of a hard-working farmer who grows enough crops not only to feed themselves, but another 200 people, he said.
Farming has proven to be sustainable since it started with Adam and Eve when they were cast out of Eden 6,000 years ago, Dixon said.
Farmers have developed tried-and-true methods to feed a hungry world, while becoming better stewards of the land and environment, he said.
"There are many reasons ladies and gentlemen why we are a free nation," Dixon said. "Perhaps all of them put together cannot equal the fact that we have been able to feed ourselves. The most important energy we produce today is called food.
"Ladies and gentlemen, America must never be foolish enough to lose our ability to feed and clothe ourselves. We must be diligent to promote at all levels the idea that our farmers be given proper measured priority so that they can continue to feed a hungry world with good, safe economic food."
Dixon asked the audience members when was the last time they had seriously worried about whether they would have any food tomorrow.
Very few people can say that is the case, he said
Dixon made several reference to comments from a speech by Abraham Lincoln who once said he thought there were more attempts to flatter farmers more than any other group.
Lincoln went on to say he could not perceive the reason for that unless it was because farmers can cast the most votes, Dixon said.
"Wow, times have changed," he said.
"We no longer cast the most votes ladies and gentlemen, but there is one thing that we still do and that is that we still feed everybody who does vote."
Dixon said that Lincoln was prophetic when he said that if the interest of farming and agriculture comes into contention with other interests that it would be smart do that which will allow the other interest to yield so that farmers can continue to properly feed and clothe America.
"I believe that of necessity that those of us in industry and government and every level of activity in the state should, for our own well-being and the future well-being of our children and grandchildren, find any occasion that we can to give agriculture properly measured priority," Dixon said.
North Carolina has done one thing that Dixon said he hopes can be done on the national level -- eliminate the inheritance tax.
No group stands to benefit more than the remaining family of those who worked hard, in some cases for three or four generations, to scratch out a living as farmers, he said.
Land values are such that it does not take long for someone to be considered a millionaire based simply on land as an asset, Dixon said.
But there are not many calories in dirt, he said.
He encouraged those in attendance to re-read Paul Harvey's "God Made a Farmer" speech.
"Ladies and gentlemen, why do farmers farm?" he said. "With all of the economic adversities and frustrations and difficulties do we realize that the weather is the only constant that we face?
"Is it surprising for you to hear me say that? The weather is always constant because it is always too hot, too cold, too wet and too dry."
So why farm, he said.
Examine the issue from one end to the other and the answer is people farm because they love it, Dixon said.
"We farm because we have a connection to the earth," he said. "We love to watch plants grow. We love to be in the presence of animals. We love to work outdoors. We love to live and work where we live."
Good farmers take seriously their duties as good stewards of the earth and contribute to the welfare of society in more way than today's society understands, Dixon said.
Farmers produce valuable goods, but also preserve water, wildlife, open space and scenery, and they do it because it is in their best interest since it is the source in which farmers make a living, he said.