1 8 THE GRANGER MOVEMENT 



Just as the price which the farmer received for the commodities 

 he sold seemed to him to be fixed by those to whom he sold, so 

 also, he felt that the price of his supplies was fixed by those from 

 whom he bought. 1 The retail dealers, like the commission men, 

 were comparatively few in number and usually able to prevent 

 serious competition among themselves. Then in many parts 

 of the country and especially in the newly settled areas of the 

 western states there prevailed a credit system somewhat similar 

 to that already described in connection with the southern states. 

 The feature of crop mortgages was usually absent in the West 

 but otherwise the system was very much the same; the farmer 

 lacked ready money and was forced to buy on credit, and an 

 account having been begun, he was practically placed at the 

 mercy of the dealer until he could square himself on the books. 

 A large part of the farmers' supplies were purchased, however, 

 not from retail dealers, but from agents who handled the articles 

 on a commission for the manufacturer; this was particularly 

 true of all sorts of farm machinery, of sewing machines, and other 

 patented devices. The complaints against these agents were 

 that their large commissions unduly increased prices, that they 

 frequently persuaded farmers to purchase machinery which 

 they did not need or could not afford, and that they sold on credit 

 and in addition charged exorbitant rates of interest. 2 



The principal complaints in regard to these supplies were 

 directed, however, not against the middlemen, but against the 

 manufacturers themselves. In the general attack upon monop- 

 olists a term which was applied to practically everyone ex- 

 cept farmers and day-laborers the manufacturing establish- 

 ments operating under the protection of patents for inventions 

 came in for their full share of denunciation. That there were 

 many abuses of the privileges of patent rights is indubitable: 

 in case of meritorious inventions, the profits obtained by the 

 inventor or his assigns were often enormous; patents which 

 were about to expire were renewed and extended by means of 

 so-called improvements or through the help of political influence ; 



1 Prairie Farmer, xliii. 369, xliv. i (November 23, 1872, January 4, 1873). 



2 Martin, Grange Movement, ch. xviii. 



