2 66 



AGRICULTURAL DISCONTENT 



strong educational program expressed fear over the launching of this 

 program of "radical commercialism," while the supporters of the co- 

 operative-marketing proposal feared that the easterners would combine 

 with other sections of the country to block "the things which the Midwest 

 thought most essential to the economic readjustment of agriculture." 

 Henry C. Wallace, editor of Wallaces' Farmer, voiced the sentiments of 

 the western Middle West when he said, "This federation must not degen- 

 erate into an educational or social institution. It must be made the most 

 powerful business institution in the country." 3 



Despite the existence of older farm organizations such as the Grange, 

 the Farmers' Union, the Equity, the Missouri Farmers' Association, and 

 numerous independent commodity groups, not to mention the Non- 

 partisan League, the fact remains that the bulk of the farmers of the 

 nation were not members of a general farm organization. Except for the 

 Grangers, the combined membership of the others, substantial though 

 it might have been, was hardly impressive. The Farmers' Union had 

 passed the peak of its power, as had the Equity, which never was a strong 

 organization. The Missouri Farmers' Association was strictly a state body, 

 and before too great an elapse of time, the League was to be on the brink 

 of disaster. 31 Equally important was the fact that the Bureau appealed 

 to the type of member that could hardly have been receptive, for a very 

 long period at least, to the type of program sponsored by the Farmers' 

 Union, the Equity, or the League. 



Meanwhile, sentiment had been shaping for the formation of a national 

 organization. Early in 1919 S. L. Strivings, the president of the New York 

 Farm Bureau Federation, called a meeting of state farm bureaus to meet 

 in Ithaca, New York, on February 12 for the purpose of providing the 

 nation "with some sane organization thoroughly representative of agri- 

 culture" and to take advantage of the farm bureau movement, which 

 offered the greatest possibilities in developing a program to reach the 

 farmers of the country. The meeting was held and a committee was 

 selected to outline the best methods for bringing the national organiza- 



30. Ibid., p. 123. 



31. Edward Wiest, Agricultural Organization in the United States (Lexington, 

 Ky., 1923), pp. 398, 476-78; Missouri Farmer, XII (September 15, 1920), p. 20; see 

 also Chapter VII, pp. 194-218. 



