UNEQUAL FIGHTS 



farmers of the Northwest. At the time I am 

 writing of, four thousand of these had pledged 

 themselves and all their means in support of 

 the enterprise; its managers were all farmers 

 of substance and standing. Nevertheless, in 

 exact proportion to the increase of its receipts 

 increased also the difficulty of getting bank- 

 ing accommodations. The active field man- 

 ager of the Equity was George S. Loftus, 

 whose remarkable career and unselfish sacri- 

 fices for the public have never been sufficiently 

 told. He had been a prosperous hay and feed 

 dealer in St. Paul when a conception of the 

 struggle of the people against monopoly and 

 privilege laid hold upon him with an apostolic 

 inspiration, and he abandoned his business 

 and every personal consideration to give him- 

 self to a cause that cost him his life.^ His 

 first achievement was a successful campaign 

 he inaugurated and carried on against the 

 Pullman Sleeping Car Company to compel it 

 to lower the rates for upper berths. He car- 

 ried this through the Interstate Commerce 

 Commission and the courts, and the country 

 owes to him the 20-per-cent. reduction it has 

 ever since enjoyed. 



When the Equity started upon its fight 

 against the existing system of marketing 

 grain, Mr. Loftus gave himself wholly to the 



1 He died in 1»916 of an illness brought on by his labors and anxieties 

 in the farmers' cause. 



135 



