RESULTS OF AGRARIANISM 257 



It is rather strange that in an organized effort on 

 the part of farmers to secure economic equality 

 with other groups they have always been charged 

 with being radical. The farmer is not radical. He 

 is normally and naturally a conservative. As Bruce 

 Bliven says in a conclusion to an interesting article, 

 entitled "The Frightened Farmer/' "At heart, there 

 is no more conservative individual on earth than 

 the land-owning American of the Middle West. He 

 is blood-brother to the man on Main Street, with 

 all his horror of cults and isms and new-fangled 

 notions. The farmer's radicalism is exactly the 

 radicalism which threw the tea overboard in Boston 

 Harbor. It is an outraged sense of injustice and a 

 burning determination to leave no stone unturned 

 to secure what he regards as redress. When he gets 

 what he wants, I predict that the radicalism of the 

 farmer will disappear so quickly that overnight peo- 

 ple will wonder how they could ever have supposed 

 that the agricultural regions were anything else than 

 safe and sane." 6 



It is rather significant that rural public opinion 

 has arrived at definite conclusions with reference to 

 political policies affecting the interests of farmers. 

 No less significant has been the formulation of eco- 

 nomic organizations for marketing farm crops. 

 Farmers are now committed to a definite legislative 

 program and systems of cooperative credit and mar- 

 keting. Much relief has come already through these 



'See The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 133, No. 5, p. 686. 



