652 READINGS IN RURAL ECONOMICS 



to fight railroads. But this was not the Grange. A misconcep- 

 tion exists on this point. In everything pubhshed on the subject, 

 the anti-railroad movement is called the Granger movement ; the 

 resulting legislation, the Granger legislation ; the cases that arose, 

 the Granger cases. It must be granted that the same farmers 

 often were engaged in both movements, and that certain sub- 

 ordinate parts of the Grange did sometimes disobey their organic 

 law so far as to engage as bodies in the agitation, chiefly by 

 memorializing legislatures. It was impossible to control com- 

 pletely the rank and file of such a vast order. But, with these a 

 reservations, the Grange, as an organization, took no part in the I 

 anti-railroad agitation. The two were not cause and effect, but 

 parallel effects of the same general causes. In the way of proof 

 the "Declaration of Purposes" of 1874 has already been quoted, 

 to the effect that the Grange is not hostile to railroads, and that 

 all political action and discussion is totally excluded. The pub- 

 lished proceedings of the National. Grange show the same thing. 

 In 1874 the executive committee reported: "Unfortunately for 

 the Order, the impression prevails to some extent that its chief 

 mission is to fight railroads." In 1875 a resolution from Texas 

 favoring railroad legislation was suppressed. In 1873 the Master 

 of the Minnesota State Grange, being informed that certain 

 Granges in his jurisdiction had appointed delegates to a state 

 anti-railroad convention, ordered the offending Granges to recall 

 their delegates. Congressman D. W. Aiken, of South Carolina, 

 long a member of the National Executive Committee, said in an 

 address four years ago : 



Frequently had the Grange to bear the odium of other men's sins. . . . 

 For instance, there existed in Illinois and Wisconsin, and other sections of 

 the Northwest, agricultural clubs whose province seemed to be to wage war 

 against transportation companies. Anathemas were hurled upon the Grange 

 for making this attack, whereas every Patron of Husbandry knew that the 

 Grange as such was not a participant in the fight from beginning to end. 



It may seem surprising that such an error should have arisen, 

 but it is not inexplicable. The newspapers first applied the name 

 " Grangers " to Western farmers in general, and consequently to 



