180 THE GREEN RISING 



Wilson. But the sections of the country where the 

 Nonpartisan League had its beginning and most 

 rapid development were principally concerned with 

 economic problems that were regional rather than 

 national. For that reason the agrarian program of 

 the Wilson administration stimulated rather than 

 neutralized the Nonpartisan League movement in 

 the Middle West. 



The conditions that gave rise to the Nonpartisan 

 League were not very different from those that re- 

 sulted in the Populist movement of an earlier period. 

 The cause of unrest preceding each of these agrarian 

 political movements was the belief that farmers 

 were being exploited by corporate interests. 



Agrarian protests of the early period resulted 

 from unfair practices growing out of transportation 

 policies of the railroads. The dissatisfaction that 

 resulted in the organization of the Nonpartisan 

 League was due to unfair methods of marketing 

 grain and other farm products. 



The Nonpartisan League had its beginning in 

 North Dakota. Farmers had come to feel that they 

 were the victims of many economic grievances. For 

 a long time they believed that the system and prac- 

 tices of marketing their grain were unfair and un- 

 just to the producers. They believed that bankers, 

 merchants, and professional politicians were in 

 league with the millers to exploit them. 



The president and some of the professors of the 

 State Agricultural College at Fargo were the first 



