Farmers
Farmers and the
Populist Movement
MAIN IDEA
Farmers united to address their economic problems, giving rise to the Populist movement. Terms & Names
WHY IT MATTERS NOW
•Oliver Hudson
Kelley
•Grange
•Farmers’
Alliances
•Populism
Many of the Populist reform issues, such as income tax and legally protected rights of workers, are now taken for granted. •bimetallism
•gold standard
•William McKinley
•William Jennings
Bryan
One American's Story
As a young adult in the early 1870s, Mary Elizabeth Lease left home to teach school on the Kansas plains. After marrying farmer Charles
Lease, she joined the growing Farmers’ Alliance movement and began speaking on issues of concern to farmers. Lease joked that her tongue was “loose at both ends and hung on a swivel,” but her golden voice and deep blue eyes hypnotized her listeners.
A PERSONAL VOICE MARY ELIZABETH LEASE
“ What you farmers need to do is to raise less corn and more Hell! We want the accursed foreclosure system wiped out. . . . We will stand by our homes and stay by our firesides by force if necessary, and we will not pay our debts to the loan-shark companies until the Government pays its debts to us.”
—quoted in “The Populist Uprising”
▼
Farmers had endured great hardships in helping to transform the plains from the “Great American Desert” into the “breadbasket of the nation,” yet every year they reaped less and less of the bounty they had sowed with their sweat.
Mary Elizabeth
Lease, the daughter of Irish immigrants, was a leader of the Populist Party.
Farmers Unite to Address Common Problems
In the late 1800s, many farmers were trapped in a vicious economic cycle. Prices for crops were falling, and farmers often mortgaged their farms so that they could buy more land and produce more crops. Good farming land was becoming scarce, though, and banks were foreclosing on the mortgages of increasing numbers of farmers who couldn’t make payments on
Populist Movement
MAIN IDEA
Farmers united to address their economic problems, giving rise to the Populist movement. Terms & Names
WHY IT MATTERS NOW
•Oliver Hudson
Kelley
•Grange
•Farmers’
Alliances
•Populism
Many of the Populist reform issues, such as income tax and legally protected rights of workers, are now taken for granted. •bimetallism
•gold standard
•William McKinley
•William Jennings
Bryan
One American's Story
As a young adult in the early 1870s, Mary Elizabeth Lease left home to teach school on the Kansas plains. After marrying farmer Charles
Lease, she joined the growing Farmers’ Alliance movement and began speaking on issues of concern to farmers. Lease joked that her tongue was “loose at both ends and hung on a swivel,” but her golden voice and deep blue eyes hypnotized her listeners.
A PERSONAL VOICE MARY ELIZABETH LEASE
“ What you farmers need to do is to raise less corn and more Hell! We want the accursed foreclosure system wiped out. . . . We will stand by our homes and stay by our firesides by force if necessary, and we will not pay our debts to the loan-shark companies until the Government pays its debts to us.”
—quoted in “The Populist Uprising”
▼
Farmers had endured great hardships in helping to transform the plains from the “Great American Desert” into the “breadbasket of the nation,” yet every year they reaped less and less of the bounty they had sowed with their sweat.
Mary Elizabeth
Lease, the daughter of Irish immigrants, was a leader of the Populist Party.
Farmers Unite to Address Common Problems
In the late 1800s, many farmers were trapped in a vicious economic cycle. Prices for crops were falling, and farmers often mortgaged their farms so that they could buy more land and produce more crops. Good farming land was becoming scarce, though, and banks were foreclosing on the mortgages of increasing numbers of farmers who couldn’t make payments on