PREFACE 



THIS study originated in a series of seminars given by its senior author 

 'Hicks) during the middle 1930'$ at the University of Wisconsin. 

 At that time, neither the Old Deal nor the New Deal had reached satis- 

 factory solutions for the farmers' ills, and the evidence of discontent was 

 apparent on every hand. Since then the three Triple-A programs and the 

 second World War have changed the situation materially, and the com- 

 ing of the war has supplied a terminal date for our study. What the future 

 may hold in store for the American farmer is by no means clear, but there 

 is much evidence to support the opinion that neither the Republicans nor 

 the Democrats will risk another Populist revolt by withholding the sub- 

 sidies that now contribute so heavily to our agricultural income. 



The center of agricultural discontent during the first four decades of the 

 twentieth century lay in what we have called the western Middle West, or 

 that part of the Middle West which is bounded on the east by Lake Mich- 

 igan and the Indiana-Illinois boundary line. But the economic forces that 

 contributed to the farmers' woes had little respect for state boundaries, so 

 that it has seemed better to use in our title the more inclusive term, Middle 

 West. Even that term, if restricted to the twelve north central states, is 

 hardly adequate, but in common parlance the Middle West has come to 

 include all of the central part of the United States, and thus defined, it 

 suits our purpose reasonably well. 



A considerable portion of this book was presented by the junior author 

 (Saloutos) as a dissertation for the Ph.D. degree at the University of 



