The Farmer's Alliance
The hope of welding the farmers into an organization which would enable
them to present a united front to their enemies and to work together for
the promotion of their interests--social, economic, and political--was
too alluring to be allowed to die out with the decline of the Patrons of
Husbandry. Farmers who had experienced the benefits of the Grange, even
though they had deserted it in its hour of trial, were easily induced to
join another organization embodying all its essential features but
proposing to avoid its mistakes. The conditions which brought about the
rapid spread of the Grange in the seventies still prevailed; and as soon
as the reaction from the Granger movement was spent, orders of farmers
began to appear in various places and to spread rapidly throughout the
South and West. This second movement for agricultural organization
differed from the first in that it sprang from the soil, as it were,
and, like Topsy, "just growed" instead of being deliberately planned and
put into operation by a group of founders.
A local farmers' club or alliance was organized in 1874 or 1875 in the
frontier county of Lampasas, Texas, for mutual protection against horse
thieves and land sharks and for coöperation in the rounding up of
strayed stock and in the purchase of supplies. That it might accomplish
its purposes more effectively, the club adopted a secret ritual of three
degrees; and it is said that at first this contained a formula for
catching horse thieves. Affiliated lodges were soon established in
neighboring communities, and in 1878 a Grand State Alliance was
organized. Some one connected with this movement must have been familiar
with the Grange, for the Declaration of Purposes adopted by the State
Alliance in 1880 is but a crude paraphrase of the declaration adopted by
the earlier order at St. Louis in 1874. These promising beginnings were
quickly wrecked by political dissension, particularly in connection with
the Greenback movement, and the first State Alliance held its last
meeting in 1879. In that year, however, a member of the order who
removed to Poolville in Parker County, Texas, organized there a
distinctly non-partisan alliance. From this new center the movement
spread more rapidly; a second Grand State Alliance was organized; and
the order grew with such rapidity that by 1886 there were nearly three
thousand local lodges in the State. The social aspect was prominent in
the Alliance movement in Texas from the beginning. Women were admitted
to full membership, and negroes were excluded. In 1882 the three degrees
of the ritual were combined into one so that all members might be on the
same footing.
The early minutes of the State Alliance indicate that the rounding up of
estrays was the most important practical feature of the order at that
time, but in a few years this was overshadowed by coöperation. Trade
agreements were made with dealers, joint stock stores and Alliance
cotton-yards were established, and finally a state exchange was
organized with a nominal capital of half a million dollars to handle the
business of the members. All the difficulties which the Grange had
encountered in its attempts at coöperation beset the Alliance ventures:
dissension was spread by merchants and commission men fighting for their
livelihood; mistakes were made by agents and directors; too much was
attempted at once; and in a few years the house of cards tumbled to the
ground.
While its business ventures were still promising, the Texas Alliance
came near being wrecked once more on the shoals of politics. The state
meeting in August, 1886, adopted an elaborate set of "Demands," which
included higher taxation of lands held for speculative purposes,
prohibition of alien land ownership, laws to "prevent the dealing in
futures of all agricultural products," full taxation of railroad
property, "the rapid extinguishment of the public debt of the United
States, by operating the mints to their fullest capacity in coining
silver and gold, and the tendering of the same without discrimination to
the public creditors," the issue of legal tender notes on a per capita
basis and their substitution for bank notes, a national bureau of labor
statistics, an interstate commerce law, and the abolition of the
contract system of employing convicts. Provision was made for a
committee of three to press these demands upon Congress and the State
Legislature. At the close of the meeting, some of the members, fearing
that the adoption of this report would lead to an attempt to establish a
new political party, held another meeting and organized a rival State
Alliance.
Considerable confusion prevailed for a few months; the president and
vice-president of the regular State Alliance resigned, and the whole
order seemed on the verge of disruption. At this point there appeared on
the stage the man who was destined not only to save the Alliance in
Texas but also to take the lead in making it a national organization--C.
W. Macune, the chairman of the executive committee. Assuming the
position of acting president, Macune called a special session of the
State Alliance to meet in January, 1887. At this meeting the
constitution was amended to include a declaration that it was the
purpose of the order "to labor for the education of the agricultural
classes in the science of economical government, in a strictly
nonpartisan spirit"; and attention was then directed to a plan for "the
organization of the cotton belt of America." The first step in this
direction was taken in the same month when the Texas Alliance joined
with the Farmers' Union of Louisiana and formed the National Farmers'
Alliance and Coöperative Union of America. ¹
¹ The Farmers' Union was the outgrowth of an open farmers' club
organized in Lincoln Parish, Louisiana, in 1880. In 1885 this was
transformed into a secret society with a ritual modeled after that of
the Grange and with a constitution adapted from the constitution used by
the Texas alliances. Before the year was over the order spread into the
adjoining parishes and a state union was established.
Macune, who was elected president of the national body, at once sent
organizers into most of the Southern States; and local alliances,
followed rapidly by state organization, appeared in State after State.
When the next meeting was held in October, 1887, delegates were present
from nine Southern States. ¹ The "Demands" adopted at this meeting were
very like those which had split the Texas Alliance in the preceding
year, with the addition of sections calling for the reduction of the
tariff to a revenue basis, a graduated income tax, promotion of
industrial and agricultural education, restriction of immigration, and
popular election of United States senators.
¹ By December, 1888, it was claimed that there were 10,000 alliances in
16 States with a total membership of about 400,000. It was evident that
the organization of the farmers of the cotton belt was rapidly being
consummated.
As the Alliance spread into Arkansas and some of the adjoining States,
it encountered another farmers' association of a very similar character
and purpose. The Agricultural Wheel, as it was known, originated in a
local club in Prairie County, Arkansas, in 1882, and soon expanded into
a state-wide organization. After amalgamating with another agricultural
order, known as the Brothers of Freedom, the Wheel began to roll into
the adjoining States. In 1886 delegates from Tennessee and Kentucky
attended the meeting of the Arkansas State Wheel and took part in the
organization of the National Agricultural Wheel. ¹ When the National
Wheel held its first annual meeting in November, 1887, eight state
organizations had been established, all in the Southwest, with a total
membership of half a million.
¹ Some difficulty was occasioned at this meeting by the question of
admitting negroes to the order, but this was finally settled by making
provision for separate lodges for colored members.
With two great orders of farmers expanding in much the same territory
and having practically identical objects, the desirability of union was
obvious. The subject was discussed at meetings of both bodies, and
committees of conference were appointed. Both organizations finally
convened in December, 1888, at Meridian, Mississippi, and appointed a
joint committee to work out the details of amalgamation. The outcome was
a new constitution, which was accepted by each body acting separately
and was finally ratified by the state organizations. The combined order
was to be known as the Farmers' and Laborers' Union of America.
While this development had been going on in the South, another movement,
somewhat different in character and quite independent in origin, had
been launched by the farmers of the Northwest. The founder of the
National Farmers' Alliance, or the Northwestern Alliance, as it was
called to distinguish it from the Southern organization, was Milton
George, editor of the Western Rural of Chicago, who had been
instrumental in organizing a local alliance in Cook County. This
Alliance began issuing charters to other locals, and in October, at the
close of a convention in Chicago attended by about "five hundred,
representing alliances, granges, farmers' clubs, etc.," a national
organization was formed. The constitution adopted at this time declared
the object of the order to be "to unite the farmers of the United States
for their protection against class legislation, and the encroachments of
concentrated capital and the tyranny of monopoly; ... to oppose, in our
respective political parties, the election of any candidate to office,
state or national, who is not thoroughly in sympathy with the farmers'
interests; to demand that the existing political parties shall nominate
farmers, or those who are in sympathy with them, for all offices within
the gift of the people, and to do everything in a legitimate manner that
may serve to benefit the producer." The specific measures for which the
promoters of the Northwestern Alliance intended to work were set forth
in a platform adopted at the second annual meeting in Chicago, October
5, 1881, which demanded: equal taxation of all property, including
deduction of the amount of mortgages from assessments of mortgaged
property; "a just income tax"; reduction of salaries of officials and
their election instead of appointment, so far as practicable; regulation
of interstate commerce; reform of the patent laws; and prevention of the
adulteration of food. "The combination and consolidation of railroad
capital ... in the maintenance of an oppressive and tyrannical
transportation system" was particularly denounced, and the farmers of
the country were called upon to organize "for systematic and persistent
action" for "the emancipation of the people from this terrible
oppression."
The Northwestern Alliance did not attempt coöperation in business so
extensively as did its Southern contemporaries, but a number of Alliance
grain elevators were established in Minnesota and Dakota, coöperative
creameries flourished in Illinois, and many of the alliances appointed
agents to handle produce and purchase supplies for the members. It was
in the field of politics, however, that the activity of the order was
most notable. The methods by which the farmers of the Northwest
attempted to use their organizations for political ends are well
illustrated by the resolutions adopted at the annual meeting of the
Minnesota State Alliance in 1886 which declared that "the Alliance,
while not a partisan association, is political in the sense that it
seeks to correct the evils of misgovernment through the ballot-box," and
called upon all the producers of the State "to unite with us at the
ballot-box next November to secure a legislature that will work in the
interests of the many against the exactions of the few." The specific
demands included state regulation of railroads, free coinage of silver,
reduction of the tariff to a revenue basis, revision of the patent laws,
high taxation of oleomargarine, and reduction of the legal rate of
interest from 10 to 8 per cent. The secretary was directed to forward
copies of these resolutions to federal and state officers and to the
delegation of the State in Congress; and the members of local alliances
were "urged to submit this platform of principles to every candidate for
the legislature in their respective districts, and to vote as a unit
against every man who refuses to publicly subscribe his name to the same
and pledge himself, if elected, to live up to it."
The resolutions adopted by the National Alliance in 1887 show that the
political purposes of the order had become considerably more
comprehensive than they were when it was getting under way in 1881.
First place was now given to a plank favoring the free coinage of silver
and the issuance of "all paper money direct to the people." The demand
for railroad regulation was accompanied by a statement that "the
ultimate solution of the transportation problem may be found in the
ownership and operation by the Government of one or more
transcontinental lines"; and the immediate acquisition of the Union
Pacific, then in financial difficulties, was suggested. Other
resolutions called for government ownership and operation of the
telegraph, improvement of waterways, restriction of the liquor traffic,
industrial education in the public schools, restoration of agricultural
colleges "to the high purpose of their creation," and popular election
of Senators. The national body does not appear to have attempted, at
this time, to force its platform upon candidates for office; but it
urged "farmers throughout the country to aid in the work of immediate
organization, that we may act in concert for our own and the common
good."
The culmination of this general movement for the organization of the
farmers of the country came in 1889 and 1890. The Farmers' and Laborers'
Union and the Northwestern Alliance met at St. Louis on December 3,
1889. The meeting of the Southern organization, which was renamed the
National Farmers' Alliance and Industrial Union, was attended by about a
hundred delegates representing Indiana, Kansas, and every Southern State
from Maryland to Texas, with the exception of West Virginia. The purpose
of the two orders in holding their meetings at the same time and place
was obviously to effect some sort of union, and committees of conference
were at once appointed. Difficulties soon confronted these committees:
the Southern Alliance wanted to effect a complete merger but insisted
upon retention of the secret features and the exclusion of negroes, at
least from the national body; the Northwestern Alliance preferred a
federation in which each organization might retain its identity.
Arrangements were finally made for future conferences to effect
federation but nothing came of them. The real obstacles seem to have
been differences of policy with reference to political activity and a
survival of sectional feeling.
With the failure of the movement for union, the Southern Alliance began
active work in the Northern States; and when the Supreme Council, as the
national body was now called, held its next meeting at Ocala, Florida,
in December, 1890, delegates were present from state alliances of seven
Northern and Western States, in addition to those represented at the St.
Louis meeting. The Farmers' Mutual Benefit Association, a secret order
with about two hundred thousand members, had a committee in attendance
at this meeting, and the Colored Farmers' Alliance, which had been
founded in Texas in 1886 and claimed a membership of over a million,
held its national meeting at the same time and place. Plans were
formulated for a federation of these three bodies, and of such other
farmers' and laborers' associations as might join with them, to the end
that all might work unitedly for legislation in the interests of the
industrial classes.
Signs of approaching dissolution of the Alliance movement were already
apparent at the Ocala meeting. The finances of the Southern Alliance had
been so badly managed that there was a deficit of about $6000 in the
treasury of the Supreme Council. This was due in part to reckless
expenditure and in part to difficulties in collecting dues from the
state organizations. Discord had arisen, moreover, from the political
campaign of 1890, and an investigating committee expressed its
disapproval of the actions of the officers in connection with a
senatorial contest in Georgia. The decline of the Southern Alliance
after 1890 was even more rapid than that of the Grange had been. The
failure of many of the coöperative ventures contributed to this decline;
but complications and dissensions resulting from the establishment of a
new political party which took over the Alliance platform, were
principally responsible. The Northwestern Alliance continued for a few
years, practically as an adjunct to the new party but it, too, lost
rapidly in membership and influence. With the year 1890 interest shifts
from social to political organization, from Alliances to Populism.