90 HOW THE CLUBS BECAME GRANGES. 



die-men. The farmers holding stock would thus control both the 

 capital and the crop, and could easily prevent it from being an 

 engine of oppression. It need not necessarily, be organized to 

 secure profit and declare dividends; these results would be obtained 

 by cheap freights and increased prices for produce, and the profit 

 would be found in &quot; farming.&quot; Each stockholder should be a mem 

 ber of a Farmers Club. 



3d. We also recommend the incorporation of the State Farmers 

 Union, with a capital of $1,000,000. 



The benefits to be derived from this organization may be outlined as 

 follows: The several clubs at their meetings can report the prospects 

 of the crops from time to time, to the Union, and the probable amount 

 of the several products; the estimates of the county thus made and 

 forwarded promptly to the officers of the State Union, will enable 

 them to make estimates of the number of sacks required, and the 

 tonnage necessary to convey the crops to foreign markets. 



The officers of the State Union, by observation of the prospects 

 in foreign countries, and the East, will be enabled early to form 

 an estimate of the value of the several products of export. Thus 

 the farmers, by their agents, will be able to fix the prices of their 

 own products, and by the moneys and credits established by and 

 represented in these exportations, they will be able to maintain the 

 prices they may agree upon. 



Thus organized, thus combined for the maintenance of our rights, 

 we will be able to bid defiance to the monopolists who have been 

 preying upon us in the past; and if we cannot entirely dispose of 

 the &quot; middle-men,&quot; who stand between the producer and consumer, 

 we shall be able at least to induce a more liberal division with us, 

 of the fruits of our toil, to compel them to live less sumptuously, 

 to ride in less elegant carriages, drawn by slower horses. 



Nor was this all talk, as the liberal subscriptions to the stock 

 of the local and county clubs bore testimony. All farmers, 

 whether members of the clubs or not, were invited to cooperate 

 in obtaining sacks at reduced prices. At the above-mentioned 

 meeting of the Sonoma Club, Mr. Isaac De Turk proposed the 

 establishment of an experimental farm, and supported his 

 views by strong and well considered reasons. 



The Dixon Club drew up a petition to Congress for the re 

 peal of the duty on grain sacks, which was duly communicated 

 to the other clubs for their signatures. On the 1st of March, 

 there was an fTYimflnafi pawing o f farmers at 8tockt6fa. io in 

 corporate the San Joaquiu Farmers Union, with a proposed 

 capital stock of $300,000. 



This indeed looked like a &quot;revolt of the field.&quot; &quot;Farmers 

 should combine against monopolists,&quot; said Mr. Paulsell; &quot;and 

 to protect their own interests, the association proposed to de- 



