The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1889-07-09
THE FARMERS ASSOCIATION.

Col. L. L. Polk, editor of the excel
lent Raleigh PROGRESSIVE FARMER, who
is President of the Interstate Farmers
Association, has called meeting to
be held in Montgomery, Ala, on the
Goth of August. 1t IS to be a very
important meeting. The Messenger,
that has so large a constituency among
the farmers, cannot be ~uninterested in
anything that concerns their pros
perity, happiness and health. The
farmers have through the years been
slow to combine for their own protec-
ton when all manner of combinations
were formed against them. Year
after year they have suffered from
hostile laws and from a want of wis
dom on their own part. They have
failed as a class to often discern in
time what most concerned their in
terests. Here and there were farmers
who were wide awake and understood
every movement on the chessboard
and were ready to combine with the
others in measures of self-protection.
But latterly a marked advance has
been made. Within the last three
years 5he awakening among the farm
ers has been conspicuous, and good is
following from well directed efforts.
We hope that wise views will be
urged when the Association meets in
August, and that measures of reform
and preservation will be adopted, and
that great good to all may result from
the action of the body. We shall
watch its deliberations with interest.
Wilmington Messenger.
That spirit of justice and true man
illness, which is characteristic of hon
orable and unselfsh men, prompted
the above plain avowal of truth. The
farmers sought the protection afforded
by combination, only when driven to
it by "all manner of combinations
formed against them" And every
day and every hour develops schemes
for plundering the farmers, which
strengthens and justifes their action
in seeking to defend their interests.
The farmers of the South represent
II per cent. of her working popula-
ton and SO per cent. of all the agri-
cultural population of this country,
and upon their judgment, patriotism,
courage and action greatly depend the
perpetuity of our free institutions, as
well as the industrial progress Of the
country. That man who does not see
that, we are standing face to face with
critical and trying times, is lamenta-
bly, weak, or wilfully blind. In u
Judgment, the next two decades will
constitute the crucial era in our his
tory, and it will require the Hottest
patriotism, the sternest integrity and
the most heroic courage to guide our
Ship Of State safely through the perils
which she must encounter. The prob
lens, social, moral and political, which
confront US, when viewed Alright, are
Of appalling magnitude. No class Of
our people can feel a more intense and
profound concern in a proper and wise
solution of these problems than our
farmers. In 1860 they constituted
one-half our population and owned
one-half the wealth of the country,
and during that decade they had in
creased their values 101 per cent. In
1880 they still constituted about one
half the population, but owned only
one third of the wealth of the country,
and during the preceding two decades
they had lost in values 90 per cent,
while the aggregate values had in.
creased 10 per cent. This statement
of facts alone is sufficient to arouse
profound apprehension, if not alarm,
in the minds of all patriots, and slim
ulate an immediate and earnest in
quiry as to the causes and the remedy.
1t is this state of things that is caus-
ing this great and unprecedented up
heaval among those who clothe and
feed the world and who bear the great
burdens Of government on their
shoulders. 1t is this that brought the
Alliance into being. 1t is this that
will bring together that great conven.
ton of representative agriculturists at
Montgomery on the goth prox. It is
this that is bringing the leading jour,
mails and thinkers of the country to
an earnest and patriotic consideration
OF the situation. 1t is this that com