THE NATIONAL ALLIANCE. 107 



ing, and utter dissolution seemed imminent and almost certain. I was at 

 the time chairman of the Executive Committee, and by direction of the 

 president I succeeded in securing a conference between the officers of 

 the State Alliance and the officers of the element that had seceded, the 

 result of which was that the seceders agreed to take no further steps, but 

 hold their charter in abeyance till the next regular meeting of the 

 State Alliance. Immediately after the conference, the president and 

 vice-president resigned, and by virtue of my office I called a meeting of 

 the State Alliance to convene in January, 1887, for the purpose of filling 

 the vacancies and taking such other action as the necessities of the order 

 demanded. I immediately wrote to Hon. A. J. Streeter of Illinois, who 

 was then president of the National Farmers' Alliance, and Hon. J. Bur- 

 rows of Nebraska, who was vice-president of that order, for information 

 in regard to the origin, history, methods, and purposes of the National 

 Alliance ; also to Brother J. A. Tetts of Louisiana, who was prominent 

 in the work of the Louisiana Farmers' Union, asking like information in 

 regard to the Union. The Western Rural was at that time published as 

 the official organ of the National Alliance, and its editor, Mr. Milton 

 George, was the national secretary. I received the Western Rural regu- 

 larly, and preserved the published rulings of the national secretary as to 

 qualifications for membership, and the rules prevailing in the National 

 Alliance governing charters, etc. The Louisiana Union showed by its 

 constitution that it was practically the same organization then existing in 

 Texas as the Farmers' Alliance, and that it differed only in name ; and 

 as I had notice that Louisiana would have a called meeting just prior to 

 the called meeting in Texas, I appointed Brother Evan Jones a delegate 

 to visit the Louisiana Union and make overtures in behalf of unity. He 

 was well received, and a committee of one from the Union was elected 

 to visit the called meeting of the Texas State Alliance, and empowered 

 to act in behalf of the Union in taking steps for the extension of the 

 work into new fields. All, this may seem like dry detail, but it is neces- 

 sary in order to properly understand the exact conditions that sur- 

 rounded and controlled the formation of the National- Farmers' Alliance 

 and Co-operative Union of America, when there was already in existence 

 a National Farmers' Alliance in the States farther north. It is unques- 

 tionably very necessary to show that the second National Alliance was 

 not instituted in opposition to, or as a rival of, the National Alliance 

 then in existence, if such be the case, and I believe it was. 



The called meeting of the State Alliance of Texas, held in the city of 

 Waco, in January, 1887, i a noted landmark in the history of the 

 Alliance. At that meeting provision was made for the organization of 



