Cheap Foreign Labor, 1937

From an Aug. 4, 1937 article in Raleigh News & Observer:

“Tell me about China and Japan and cheap foreign labor when my own Nash County men and women work in the potato fields for 50 cents a day and board themselves” Congressman Harold D. Cooley.

But don’t blame the potato grower, he can’t pay any more than that when prices aren’t returning him the cost of producing, Cooley said.

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And from the Cooley Library, Nashville, NC (http://library.townofnashville.com/information.html)

The women of Nashville’s civic clubs founded Harold D. Cooley Library in 1942. The library was dedicated to Congressman Harold Dunbar Cooley, a Nashville, North Carolina, native and a U.S. Congressman from 1934 until 1966.

Mr. Cooley made extensive contributions to the field of agriculture by serving as chairman of the House Agriculture Committee from 1949 to 1966. He was also instrumental in the nation’s farming program by his key role in the development of the Farmers Home Administration, the Soil Conservation Service, the Crop Insurance Program, the Tobacco Program as well as the Wheat and Cotton Programs, numerous farm bills, preparation and passage of soil conservation legislation, the Federal Crop Insurance Program, and the Food for Freedom Act. For his extensive contributions to farming and agriculture, the North Carolina Farm Bureau, the North Carolina State Grange, and the Progressive Farmer honored Mr. Cooley with Man of the Year Awards.