l6 THE GRANGER MOVEMENT 



FARMERS, MERCHANTS, AND MANUFACTURERS 



Among the economic doctrines propounded by the agricul- 

 tural agitators of the seventies, none was more frequently heard 

 or appears to have been more popular with the farmers than 

 one which bears a resemblance to some of the ideas of the physio- 

 cratic philosophers of pre-revolutionary France. Like the phys- 

 iocrats, the farmers were wont to look upon agriculture and land 

 as the source of all wealth l and to divide society into the two 

 classes of producers and non-producers, including in the latter 

 all those engaged in the distribution of the products of the former. 

 Although the indispensableness of the non-productive class to 

 society was often admitted, that class was nevertheless looked 

 upon distinctly as a necessary evil, which ought to be restricted 

 to the smallest possible dimensions; and it was always stated 

 that the proportion of the returns received by the distributing 

 factors was altogether too large, and, conversely, that received 

 by the producers was too small. 2 Next in importance to trans- 

 portation among these factors were the middlemen who served 

 as agents for the distribution of commodities between producer 

 and consumer : and it was against the exactions of these middle- 

 men that much of the wrath of the farmers was directed. From 

 the standpoint of the farmer the middlemen were of two principal 

 classes: the commission merchants and produce buyers through 

 whom he disposed of his products, and the numerous agents 

 and retail dealers through whom he purchased his supplies. 3 



When the farmer carried the product of his summer's work 

 to market and found himself practically obliged to dispose of 



1 For example, the Prairie Farmer, the leading agricultural paper of the North- 

 west, offered in 1869, as a premium for subscriptions, an allegorical picture depicting 

 the relation of the farmer to the " so-called professions and business occupations " 

 in which the farmer was represented as saying, " I pay for all." See Prairie Farmer, 

 xl. 364 (November 6, 1869). 



2 For a sample of this sort of economic reasoning, see R. H. Furgeson, " Coopera- 

 tion," an address in Illinois State Grange, Proceedings, iv. 91-96 (1875). See also 

 Carr, Patrons of Husbandry, 131-140. 



3 On this subject generally, see F. A. Fetter, " The Theory of the Middleman " 

 and P. M. Kieley, " The Middleman in Practice," both in L. H. Bailey, ed., Cyclo- 

 pedia of American Agriculture, iv. 239-243. 



