566 RURAL SOCIOLOGY 



for North Dakota by act of the legislature, instead of by vote 

 of the people. It proposed to remove the limit of indebtedness 

 that might be incurred by the State or any political division 

 thereof. It proposed to exempt farm improvements from tax- 

 ation and to authorize the issue of currency by State banks. 

 It proposed State ownership of flour mills, terminal elevators, 

 railroads, packing houses and to allow the State to engage in 

 any and all forms of business and industry. It proposed that 

 ''three bona fide farmers" should be elected to the Supreme 

 Court of the State. It proposed State Socialism on a scale 

 never before attempted in this country and never attempted any- 

 where except quite recently by Lenine and Trotzky in Russia. 



Objection has been offered, also, by the business interests 

 against the plan of a chain of cooperative stores and banks, 

 proposed by the League leaders and for which more than 

 $1,000,000 have been subscribed by the farmers who have 

 no voice in the control of these enterprises, no share of dividends 

 and no control of funds, but who have the privilege of trading 

 at such stores "at cost, plus 10 per cent./' for cash. The 

 League is opposed also because its leaders are avowed Socialists 

 and in favor of applying the most radical Socialistic theories 

 to the government of the States in which they secure control. 



SOME OF THE DEMANDS REASONABLE 



But these questions can be fought out in peace times, just 

 as the fallacies of the Farmers' Alliance and the Populist party 

 were rejected and the meritorious measures adopted by the 

 legislatures of those days. No one contends that all of the 

 claims of the Nonpartisan League are unjustified. Some of 

 them are just and must be recognized by legislative action. The 

 difficulty with the farmer to-day is that, because of the abolition 

 of party lines through the nonpartisan primary laws, in force 

 throughout the Northwest, he feels the lack of leadership, the 

 need of organization through which to make his appeals and 

 demands for legislative action. With every politician for him- 

 self, no responsibility anywhere, the farmer, who is naturally 

 a conservative, is forced to turn to radical leaders who want to 

 lead him into the mire of Socialism. 



