THE FARM LAND 47 



In the 187CTs the troubles of the western farmers had be' 

 come so acute that they had organised political parties, first 

 the Grangers, and later the Populists. These parties wanted to 

 regulate the sale of land and the costs of transportation, and 

 provide a way to borrow money at low rates of interest. The 

 parties failed as parties. Nevertheless, their attacks on unfair 

 railroad rates set in motion the forces which finally pushed 

 through Congress the Interstate Commerce Act to regulate 

 railroads. 



The World War opened a great new foreign market for 

 American agricultural products. The allies, with all their men 

 in the trenches, had few at home to grow food. In their stead, 

 the American farmer supplied the grain and the meat that fed 

 the armies and civilians behind the lines. These farmers were, 

 for the most part, descendants of those who had settled in the 

 Middle West a half century before. 



The prices of land skyrocketed; machinery, now even more 

 necessary, cost huge sums. The farmers borrowed money at 

 high rates of interest to buy this land and machinery. Taxes 

 mounted to pay the increasing costs of government. Farmers' 

 money was invested in huge land drainage and irrigation 

 projects. 



Just when this load of debts was heaviest, the market crashed 

 again. The war ended, and the soldiers who were left went 

 back to their fields in Hungary, Germany, Rumania, France. All 

 Europe owed the United States billions of dollars, and our 

 high tariff kept European manufactured products out of this 

 country. This meant that foreign nations could not sell their 

 products here, and thus earn money to pay their debts and buy 

 American farm products. It also meant that they had to reply 

 to our high tariff policy with a tariff on what they bought from 

 America, mostly farm products. 



The price for which the farmer sold his goods sank. The 

 costs of government, labor, and machinery and the many things 



