CHAPTER X 



THE ECONOMIC PROTEST AND THE 

 COOPERATIVE MOVEMENT 



Agrarianism reached its culmination in the co- 

 operative marketing movement that has developed 

 since the World War. This latest expression of 

 rural discontent did not come as a sudden and 

 spontaneous outburst on the part of the farm 

 population. The immediate cause of rural unrest 

 was the financial depression that swept over the 

 country in 1919 and 1920. But the rapidity with 

 which the cooperative movement spread, and the 

 quality of leadership it produced, indicate that it 

 was the culmination of social and economic in- 

 fluences that have been seeking for a long time a 

 logical and effective form of expression. 



"What to many seemed a sudden independent 

 outburst," says Kile, "was in fact but a phase in 

 a long, slow growth It is but the culmina- 

 tion and latest expression of a crusade which had 

 its inception back in the dark days following the 

 Civil War and which with varying degrees of vigor 

 and success ever since has pushed forward the 

 farmers' fight for free and equal privilege and 

 opportunity. 



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