NONPARTISAN LEAGUE! BEGINNINGS 



In the beginning the Nonpartisan League had attempted to capitalize 

 on the differences existing between town and country. Consequently the 

 opposition among city people was not surprising, for they found them- 

 selves excluded from the organization. They felt that the League as a 

 political power would benefit the farmer at their expense. Limiting the 

 organization to farmers was a strong point in the beginning, but as time 

 elapsed it became a source of weakness. 107 



The outcome of the conference of producers and consumers in St. Paul 

 was exactly the opportunity that the opposition was waiting for, and it 

 was the signal for a general assault against the League, especially in 

 Minnesota. Storms of protest arose. Both La Follette and the League 

 were charged with pro-Germanism, treachery, partnership with the 

 Kaiser, and the other crimes against the country. La Follette was threat- 

 ened with a trial and expulsion from the United States Senate. Among 

 the most vigorous opponents of the League was the Minnesota Public 

 Safety Commission, of which Judge John F. McGee was the dominating 

 personality and only one of the many Minnesota citizens believing that 

 what the state needed was a few "necktie parties." McGee was quoted as 

 stating that "a Nonpartisan League lecturer is a traitor every time. In 

 other words, no matter what he says or does, a League worker is a 

 traitor." * ' 8 Other prominent citizens also accused League leaders of dis- 

 loyalty and of obstructing the draft. 



League leaders tried hard to refute the accusations of disloyalty by 

 asserting their Americanism. North Dakota leaders pointed to the speaker 

 of their senate, who was an American of New England stock; to the 

 speaker of the house, who came to North Dakota from the South, and 

 to many others of foreign stock who were American-born. If what the 

 farmers of the Nonpartisan League produced was a European product, 

 so were the Declaration of Independence, the federal Constitution, the 

 United States Congress, and the deeds of countless numbers of promi- 

 nent Americans who had been influenced by European thought. The 

 activities of the League were compared with Shays' Rebellion, the Amer- 

 ican Revolution, Populism, Wat Tyler's Revolt, the Lollard movement, 



107. Arthur Warner, "The Farmer Butts Back," The Nation, CXI (August 28, 

 1920), pp. 240-41. 



108. George M. Stephenson, John Lind of Minnesota (Minneapolis, 1935), pp. 

 334, 336, 338. 



