Does Freedom to Farm Have Its Own Safety Net?

July 15, 1999

With both President Clinton and Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman questioning the effectiveness of the1996 farm law and wondering out loud if it should be revised, the law's immediate fate may seem precarious at best. Despite its perceived flaws, however, it appears unlikely to seasoned Washington insiders that any assault on the so-called Freedom to Farm law will be successful. Farmers like many of its provisions, Republicans still control Congress, and Democrats haven't tabled a comprehensive alternative.

Congress is caught to some extent between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand the 1996 farm law is not an unpopular law among farmers. They like the planting flexibility, they're able to financially plan to some extent based on annual payments, which of course decline each year, and they like the fact there are no controls on supply. On the other hand is the almost annual funnel through which extra money flows to the production agriculture community despite congressional protestations that farmers are to assume more of their own financial destiny. The latter implies something's wrong with agricultural policy: despite Congress' best efforts, farmers keep coming back to Capitol Hill for more money and getting it.

"When you go through a price situation like we are this year, you can anticipate that people are going to point the finger at something, and they're pointing now at Freedom to Farm," says a Washington ag consultant who has served Republican administrations in USDA. "But it's one thing to point the finger and quite another to get a consensus on an alternative that would be fundamentally better than Freedom to Farm. If farmers like it, what are you going to do? Go back to deficiency payments?"

A Democratic House official questions whether there will be justification for the 1996 farm law if Congress gives farmers another $6-9 billion this year on top of the massive bailout late last year. "If Congress is going to turn around and give farmers money every time they're hurting, you've already sacrificed any budget savings we made," he says.

The prevailing thinking on Capitol Hill, says this official, is that as long as neither party has more than a six-seat majority, farmers always will have a flow of money coming from Washington. He admits that's "the most cynical view."

"While a lot of the focus is on Freedom to Farm, the major provisions are still popular, and in the end, I don't think Freedom to Farm will be changed. But there will be a lot of discussion," says the ag consultant.

Says the Democratic House official, "We haven't rescued farmers from low prices before, because we had programs that did that. So why wouldn't the public say, let's go back to the old program where at least we can control expenditures? Clearly we can't do it this way."

Both agree with what probably is another prevailing thought in Washington: Freedom to Farm is safe from radical overhaul until it is superseded in 2002 by either an extension or a new approach to farm policy. Meanwhile, Congress quite likely will approve another emergency aid bill this fall, once the crop price outlook is better known.