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Initially, farmers capitalized on the new technologies and new markets of America's growing economy. However, they soon faced increased competition, saturated markets, and falling prices for their products. By the last decades of the century, their share of the national wealth had declined, and their iconic place in the American nation was at risk.
"Protective" Tariffs!
The aim of American protective tariffs during the Gilded Age was to try to guarantee the American manufacturer a profit on the American market. The federal government consciously sought to achieve this aim as a means of encouraging the industrial revolution after the Civil War. By putting an import tax on manufactured goods being imported into the United States by foreign manufacturers, the government hoped to make them more expensive than the similar American manufactured goods. This virtually guaranteed that American consumers, seeking to use their income, would buy American goods. However, when American politicians decided that domestic industry needed a helping hand in the form of protective tariffs, foreign nations retaliated by placing their own tariffs on American farm goods. Prices were falling, and no one overseas was buying.
The goals intended for protective tariffs didn't work out as planned, and the agricultural economy suffered because of it as farmers fell victim to an unpredictable market. They were forced to buy all the manufactured goods they needed for survival (on a market protected by tariffs) at artificially high prices, while selling what they produced (on a largely unprotected and highly competitive market) at depressed prices because of oversupply and foreign competition.
Although protective tariffs were one of the many reasons why American industry grew so quickly during the nineteenth century, farmers felt discriminated against because they felt that the tariffs were applied primarily to manufactured goods, while agrarian interests were left to fend for themselves.
The goals intended for protective tariffs didn't work out as planned, and the agricultural economy suffered because of it as farmers fell victim to an unpredictable market. They were forced to buy all the manufactured goods they needed for survival (on a market protected by tariffs) at artificially high prices, while selling what they produced (on a largely unprotected and highly competitive market) at depressed prices because of oversupply and foreign competition.
Although protective tariffs were one of the many reasons why American industry grew so quickly during the nineteenth century, farmers felt discriminated against because they felt that the tariffs were applied primarily to manufactured goods, while agrarian interests were left to fend for themselves.
Farmers Unite!
In reaction to numerous political demands and suppression from big corporations, farmers joined and cooperated with each other to develop self-help programs and alliances.
The Grange |
The "Wish List" Populists! |
In the 1870s, a farm organization known as the Patrons of Husbandry (aka The Grange) created a program that allowed farmers to become a more self-sufficient community. In an attempt to help farmers gain more money, the Grange hoped to eliminate middlemen and create a way for farmers to both buy and sell from each other in a protected market.
Despite heroic efforts by Grangers, the cooperative movement failed for a variety of reasons.
Farmers, desperate to convert their remaining crop into cash to meet debts and survive, were forced to sell to local buyers at whatever price they could get The Farmers' AllianceBecause of the failure of the Grange to solve problems through its self-help programs, farmers began to become more militant. They created the Farmers' Alliance, an organization that aimed to handle agrarian problems on more of a political scale.
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Burdened by heavy debts and falling prices, many farmers formed the Populist Party, which emerged to represent agrarian interests at the national level.
The Populist Party proposed numerous reforms that included:
The Populist Party organized the farmers and gave them a strong voice in an age where their pleas for help were drowned out in the booms of industry. |
So although they faced many hardships, farmers united and found strength in numbers to not only thrive economically, but to also preserve the agrarian identity of the nation during the Gilded Age.