98 THE GRANGER MOVEMENT 



old parties. Two supreme court judges and many county 

 officials were also elected by the Independents. 1 



The " People's Independent " party of California, which had 

 been fairly successful in the legislative elections of 1873, did 

 not have an opportunity to take part in a state election until 

 1875. In that year candidates were put in the field by all three 

 of the parties, the outcome being the election of the Democratic 

 ticket with about sixty-two thousand votes, the Republican 

 vote being thirty-one thousand and the Independent, thirty 

 thousand. 2 



Although some striking results were achieved by these Inde- 

 pendent parties in 1873 and 1874, and in a few states in 1875, 

 their careers were all brief. In Michigan, Missouri, Kansas, 

 and Nebraska, where the movement met with little success, 

 nothing further was heard of it after 1874. The Independent 

 Reform parties of Indiana and Illinois took part in the forma- 

 tion and became component parts of the National Greenback 

 party in 1875 and i876; 3 and as such cast considerably smaller 

 votes than they had in 1874, although enough Independents 

 and Greenbackers were elected to the legislature in Illinois to 

 hold the balance between the two old parties and bring about 

 the election of Judge David Davis as an Independent to the 

 United States Senate. 4 In Wisconsin and Iowa, the fusion of 



1 Chicago Tribune, 1874, April 16, p. 8, April 17, p. 5, May 6, p. 4, June 3, p. 5, 

 June 4, p. 5, June 26, p. 2; American Annual Cyclopedia, 1874, pp. 671-674. 



2 W. J. Davis, History of Political Conventions in California, 331-333; T. H. 

 Hittell, History of California, iv; Appleton's Annual Cyclopedia, 1875, PP- 98-101. 



3 The State Farmers' Association of Illinois was represented by delegates in 

 the conventions at Cleveland and Philadelphia, in 1875, which made arrangements 

 for the national " Independent " or Greenback convention in Indianapolis, May 

 17, 1876. See the proceedings at the third annual session of the association in 

 Prairie Farmer, xlv. 403, xlvi. 35, 38 (December 19, 1874, January 30, 1875). On 

 the last stages of the Independent Reform party in Illinois and its transition to 

 the Greenback party, see ibid. xliv. 163, 196 (May 22, June 19, 1875); Western 

 Rural (Chicago), xiii. 196 (June 19, 1875); Appleton's Annual Cyclopedia, 1875, 

 p. 393, 1876, p. 392; Moses, Illinois, ii. 834, 839, 848-850. The fourth and fifth, 

 which were probably the last, annual sessions of the State Farmers' Association, 

 were held in January, 1876, and January, 1877. Industrial Age, 1876, February 

 5, March 25; Illinois State Farmers' Association, Proceedings, v (1877). 



4 Judge Davis had been agreed upon as the independent member of the electoral 

 commission to decide the Hayes-Tilden contest, but his election to the Senate at 



