COOPERATIVES, 1920-32 287 



The second decade of the twentieth century, as already seen, had wit- 

 nessed a remarkable growth in cooperatives. State bureaus of marketing, 

 agricultural experiment stations, federal bureaus, and the publicity depart- 

 ments of the countless associations spread the merits of cooperatives far 

 and wide. Commissions appointed to study the cooperative movement 

 abroad helped to popularize it, and the United States Department of 

 Agriculture aided by devising a model bill that was used as a guide by a 

 number of states in drawing up legislation from 1917 to 1921. Published 

 works on agricultural marketing by men such as G. Harold Powell, Louis 

 D. H. Weld, and John Lee Coulter appeared which helped prepare the 

 farmers and the general public for the next wave of cooperative growth. 2 



The year 1920 was a high point in cooperative organization. More 

 cooperatives were formed that year than during any previous time. In the 

 American Farm Bureau Federation conferences of 1919 and 1920, the 

 representatives from the western Middle West won out in the battle to 

 decide whether the policy of the Farm Bureau was to be strictly one of 

 promoting agricultural education or one of launching a program of "com- 

 mercial radicalism." 3 Another sign of rising sentiment was the periodic 

 references that were made by the Republicans to the benefits of coopera- 

 tive marketing and credit associations. 4 



The events of 1920 were merely an indication of what was to follow; 

 much legislation was passed, investigations were staged, and important 

 conferences were held. Congress, amidst the agitation of the farm bloc, 

 the strength of which was great in the western Middle West, and the 



1936), pp. 8, 16-17; "Congress and Cooperative Marketing," Congressional Digest, 

 IV (October, 1925), pp. 255-87. 



2. Porter R. Taylor, "What State Marketing Agencies have Accomplished in Ten 

 Years," Eighth Annual Meeting, Proceedings of the National Association of Mar%et- 

 ing Officials, Chicago, 1926, pp. 57-63; Henry H. Bakken and Marvin A. Schaars, 

 The Economics of Cooperative Marketing (New York, 1937), p. 289; L. D. H. Weld, 

 The Marketing of Farm Products (New York, 1916); George Harold Powell, 

 Cooperation in Marketing (New York, 1913); John Lee Coulter, Cooperation 

 Among Farmers (New York, 1911). For a convenient summary of those publica- 

 tions which helped propagandize the cooperative movement, see Chastina Gardner, 

 Cooperation in Agriculture, Farm Credit Administration, Cooperative Division, 

 Bulletin 4 (Washington, 1936). 



3. Orville M. Kile, The Farm Bureau Movement (New York, 1921), p. 115. 



4. Republican Campaign Textboo^, 7920, p. 128; "Harding on Agriculture," New 

 Republic, XXIV (September 22, 1920), p. 84. 



