PREFACE. 7 



course of the great Railroad Monopolies that have sprung up in 

 our midst. These vast and powerful corporations have inaugu- 

 rated a series of abuses which have gradually and effectually un- 

 dermined the solid basis upon which our finances were supposed 

 to rest. They have debauched and demoralized our Courts and 

 Legislatures ; have bribed and taken into their pay the high 

 public officials charged with the making and execution of our 

 laws ; have robbed the nation of a domain sufficient to consti- 

 tute an empire; have flooded the land with worthless stocks 

 and other so-called securities; have established a system of 

 gambling at our financial centres that has resulted in a mone- 

 tary crisis which must cover the whole land with ruin and suffer- 

 ing ; have set at defiance the laws of the land, and have trampled 

 upon individual and public rights and liberties, openly boasting 

 that they are too powerful to be made amenable to the law ; 

 and not content with all this, not satisfied with the ruin they have 

 wrought, they propose to petition the National Legislature to give 

 them still greater means of robbing and oppressing the people. 

 The Grange seeks to array the agricultural class nearly one- 

 half of our whole population as a compact body against these 

 evils, and by thus opposing a solid front to the monopolists and 

 their selfish and unpatriotic schemes, to awaken the entire 

 nation to a sense of the danger with which it is threatened, and 

 secure its co-operation in the enforcement of measures which 

 will remove the evil and bring about a more healthful state of 

 affairs. The Grange offers to the farmers the most practicable 

 means of bettering their condition, and while it confines its 

 membership strictly to the agricultural class, it appeals power- 

 fully to the general public for sympathy and encouragement. 

 Believing as he does, that the farmer has suffered great and 

 cruel wrongs, the Author has endeavored to tell his story for 

 him, and to show to the reader wherein it is true. 



