Alan Keyes
December 1995

You know, not long ago in New Hampshire, a young lady walked up to me and said, "You're the candidate who talks about morality all the time, aren't you?" And I had to allow as how I'd been accused of that. And we got into a little exchange, because she thought it was too divisive an issue to be brought up in American politics.

Well, you know, there are people who think that we don't have any common moral values, that we stand on no common ground with respect to our principles.

Now, I know that you don't think that. Because that part of our country, if you look back in our history, which has been the firmest ground for our sense of moral integrity and moral principle has in fact been rural America--the folks who still understand the connection between hard work and success; who still understand, as well, something that is even more important, which is the connection between this nation's prosperity, its ability to achieve in an economic sense, and the strength of its families.

That connection is, of course, one of the main themes of my campaign, since I believe in the old understanding of "economics"--which, as the Greeks understood, the word itself does not mean the art of managing money. It actually means the art of managing the household. And it is understood that a strong family is the foundation of strong economic life.

Nowhere has that been better understood than in the agricultural sector. It's the reason why, probably, we are always hearing the various policies and programs that have been implemented in agriculture. They're always sold, aren't they, under the rubric of protecting the family farm--because we understand somehow that that family farm is indeed the symbol of the pristine moral strength of this country. And it represents the connection between our economic success and the maintenance of our moral heritage.

That's something that I think you understand. I've found a lot of appreciation for the moral agenda, the moral priorities, in Iowa--people who understand that we've got to rebuild our support for the moral and material foundations of family life. But given how important the agricultural sector has been there, that's got to mean that we are, in fact, going to rebuild our proper respect for the true meaning of the family farm, which has been, throughout human history, the paradigm of economics with respect to family life.

It's strange, though, that over the course of this country's history, in the last several decades, we've heard a lot about family farmers, while they have more and more been disappearing--have you noticed that? Yes, it's true! Every time somebody gets up in the well of Congress to argue for another farm bill, based on how much good it's going to do the family farmer, we end up going through a period where we lose more and more family farmers. Aren't you guys suspicious yet that this agro-socialism really isn't what it's cracked up to be, and that no matter how many times people come before you and say that some new version of this agro-socialism is going to be good for family farmers, it's going to be just as destructive as it has ever been?

And I think that it's time we started to stand up and admit that we don't need "more flexible" agro-socialism. We don't need "more optional" agro-socialism. We need to END agro-socialism in America, and get rid of that role of government which has been substituting government decisions and government structures and government programs for the genius and creativity of the American farmer.

If we do it, we might actually be able not only to see a re-strengthening of the family farm system, you might even find that you'll be attracting new generations to stay on the farm--instead of deserting in droves, as more and more of the population has been doing, to what look like the greener pastures of other ways of life.

A government-dominated agricultural sector has not been good for family farms, has not been good for families, and has been very discouraging, in fact, to the participation of new generations of farmers in the agricultural system.

And I think it's time we started to contemplate not just a modification of that system, we need to set it as our goal that we intend to end it--that we intend to put farms back in the hands of farmers.

And doing so, we will allow markets to determine, as they ought--and the efficiency of farmers in dealing with that market to determine, as it ought--what the price structure and other things ought to be. And we'll also do it in the context of a greater competitiveness in the world market. Because we are, in fact, very competitive. If we didn't have a veneer of socialism getting in the way, and if we had leadership that was willing, not just to talk about standing up and opening foreign markets, but actually to do so, we might see some results.

And I think that we're going to have to divorce ourselves from the traditional leadership in Washington, including some of the folks you heard from today, because they've been making these wonderful promises and extraordinary statements of their support for America's agricultural sector for a long time. But I haven't noticed that they have panned out in real results. And we've become less and less competitive, less and less aggressive, in dealing with countries like Japan, which ought to be fertile markets for America's agricultural goods, because they don't really have the guts, when the crunch comes, to stand up as they ought to.

I was Ambassador to the [United Nations] Economic and Social Council--I got a chance to look around the world at what other agricultural sectors look like. And you know, there's an enormous, an ENORMOUS need, for what America produces, for what you are so good at doing.

But the only way that we're going make sure that the world is able to benefit from that, and that you see the economic results that you ought to, is by removing what has been the artificially created structure of government domination from the agricultural sector.

And that would be the goal of the Keyes Administration. Not to remove, of course, those things that are necessary to protecting the farming infrastructure, in its existence, from the cycles and emergencies of time, but to remove all those things that, in the name of environment, and in the name of socialism itself, have been imposed on our agricultural sector in order to interfere with both the creativity and efficiency of our farmers and the operation of market mechanisms.

And I think that has to be our priority goal in the farming sector, because we might, if we follow that course, be able to put some families back into family farming that would be more than just a political gesture at election time.

Thank you very much.