FUNDAMENTAL CONDITIONS 19 



but worst of all, the patent office failed to make sufficiently 

 thorough investigations to prevent the occasional issuance of 

 patents on articles or principles which were in no sense inventions 

 but had long been in common use. This seems to have been 

 the case, for example, with the Teal patent on a sliding gate 

 which was successfully fought in the courts by the Patrons of 

 Husbandry of Michigan, though not until after considerable 

 money had been collected from the farmers in the shape of 

 royalty. 1 That the monopoly based on patent rights, combined 

 with the expensive agency and commission system of selling, 

 resulted in exorbitant prices for farm machinery is readily seen 

 when we note that many of these protected machines were 

 shipped to Europe by the manufacturer and there sold at con- 

 siderably less than the retail price in the United States. 2 The 

 great reductions in prices which the Grangers were able to bring 

 about when they got their business departments into working 

 order also throws some light on preexisting conditions. 



FARMERS AND FINANCE 



The prevalence of a system of buying on credit among the 

 agricultural population has already been noted. Another 

 result of the general poverty, or at least of the lack of ready 

 money, among the farmers, was a widespread indebtedness as 

 represented by the growing burden of mortgages upon rural 

 property. That some of these mortgages represented enter- 

 prise and the improvement or extension of a farmer's operations 

 is probably true, but it is also true that many of them indicated 

 straitened financial circumstances. The worst part of the 

 situation was the excessive rate of interest, running as high as 

 fifteen or twenty per cent, which was often exacted for these 

 loans. The West was infested with loan agents to whom the 



1 American Agriculturist, xxxviii. 493, 521 (December, 1879); Prairie Farmer t 

 xli. 185, 349, xliii. 132, 161, 252, 292, xlv. 89, 91, 129 (1870-74); National Grange, 

 Proceedings, xii. 68, xiv. 107 (1878, 1880); Michigan State Grange, Proceedings, vi. 

 60-62 (1878). 



2 Cloud, Monopolies and the People, 248-254; National Grange, Proceedings, 

 vii. 13, viii. 62 (1874, 1875); Flagg, in American Social Science Journal, vi. no 

 (July, 1874). 



