NEW DEAL: LATER STAGES 5 2 7 



definitely toward conservatism. As the Christian Science Monitor re- 

 marked, "In state after state, the combination of conservative city groups 

 with the farmers appeared to nullify that balance of power which labor 

 exercised two years ago." ' 3 The final upshot of the matter was the draft- 

 ing of the Employment Peace Act, which the Wisconsin Council of Agri- 

 culture said had been designed to protect the interests of the employer, 

 the employee, and the general public. 64 It became law in 1939 despite its 

 opposition by progressives, liberals, union labor, and farm groups like 

 the Farmers' Union, which had always taken a sympathetic stand with 

 respect to organized labor. 65 



It seems that this law was placed on the statute books not because of 

 any widespread labor disturbances in farm areas of the state, because there 

 were only two involving farm labor, but because a well-organized group, 

 traditionally opposed to labor, was able to capitalize on the conservative 

 drift. 



Trade pacts were another part of the New Deal effort to aid the farm- 

 ers. The trade-agreements program was authorized on June 12, 1934, by 

 means of an amendment to the tariff act of 1930, for the purpose of re- 

 versing the shrinkage of our foreign trade that had taken place during 

 the depression years. 66 Between 1929 and 1933, the year before the Trade 

 Agreements Act was passed, our total exports declined from $5,241,000,000 

 to $1,675,000,000. Proportionately our trade had fallen off more than had 

 the international trade of the world as a whole. 67 



The reciprocal trade treaties were met with mixed feelings in the west- 

 ern Middle West. In 1936 they were attacked by the Republican opposi- 

 tion; Landon, in particular, assailed the Canadian treaty in Minneapolis, 

 where it was quite unpopular. This attack was intended to attract the votes 

 of dairy farmers in both Wisconsin and Minnesota, who believed that the 

 increased imports from Canada had beaten down the prices of American 

 cattle and dairy products. 68 Cordell Hull immediately took to the stump 

 to defend his administration, heading straight for Minneapolis to speak 



63. Editorial, Christian Science Monitor, November 12, 1938. 



64. Wisconsin State Journal, March 2, 1939. 



65. Capital Times, March 30, May 3, 1939; Milwaukee Journal, February 17, 1939. 



66. Congressional Digest, XVIII (December, 1939), pp. 293-94. 



67. Capital Times, December i, 1938. 



68. Kansas City Star, September 25, 1936. 



