"For all practical purposes, wheat is civilization. It produces what we euphemistically call the staff of life, a staff which has recently been behaving like a boomerang...By the same token, wheat makes politics and has always made them. Whether you turn to ancient Rome, Egypt or Mesopotamia, or advert to modern times, you will find wheat working political earthquakes. Wheat, needed by England, won the Civil War for the North; then the American transcontinental lines opened the wheat empire of North America, and our wheat wrecked agriculture in Central Europe. Austria-Hungary took to growing hogs, instead, and agricultural experts swiftly decided that Serbian swine were unsanitary, laid down an embargo and started a political avalanche that led straight to Serajevo."
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Fantasy authorsColumnists from the United StatesBiographers from the United StatesJournalists from MassachusettsNovelists from Massachusetts
Original Language: English
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Sources
"Wheat in Politics", in Vanity Fair (August 1931) pp. 21–22. Reprinted: "America, China and Russia and International 'Wheat Politics'", in The China Weekly Review (August 29, 1931) pp. 492–494
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Franklin_Carter
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John Franklin Carter
1897 – 1967
John Franklin Carter (1897–1967) was an American journalist, columnist, biographer and novelist. He also wrote under the names Jay Franklin, Diplomat, and Unofficial Observer.
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