THE STORY OF THE NONPARTISAN LEAGUE 



machine was that the farmers would never 

 hold together. The commentary upon that 

 is the League's vote and membership roll. 

 Yet even that is not complete. To grasp all 

 that is portended by these records, it is neces- 

 sary to attend a meeting of typical North- 

 western farmers and note well what under- 

 currents of resolution, sober, reasoned, well 

 informed, and at all times indomitable, show 

 forth at every crisis to sweep away the last 

 doubt. The forces opposed to this movement, 

 the most significant of our times, are great, 

 powerful, relentless, well equipped. They 

 may yet succeed in wrecking it. But so far 

 this fact is certain that they have employed 

 against it the fuU armory of their resources 

 and with all their power have only speeded 

 it upon its way. And to that fact, coupled 

 with one other, that there are ten million 

 farmers in the United States, I invite the 

 attention of the thoughtful. 



We have never had in this country at large 

 a division in politics based upon the bread- 

 earning vocations of men; we have never had 

 the farmers voting as farmers, the wage- 

 earners as wage-earners. With ten million 

 farmers in the country there are not a score 

 in Congress; with four million wage-earners 

 organized into trade unions, labor is all but 

 unrepresented. If the idea struck out in the 

 mind of the bankrupted North Dakotan as 



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