1
Historiography of Agrarian Roles in Populism
Current historical consensus agrees that the agrarian role in the Populist movement of the
1890s was important, for the Populist movement was largely an agrarian movement. But just
what role the movement has played, how the agrarian role began, and what its lasting effects are,
is still debated. One of the most important works written on the Populist movement was
Democratic Promise by Lawrence Goodwyn. This was by no means the first work written on
the subject and there is a rich historiography including works by C. Vann Woodward who many
historians must still contend with in some way. But it is the intention of this study to examine
the historiography of agrarian roles in Populism after the major turning point of Goodwyn’s
work. Also to be examined is Jonathan Lurie’s article on the political power of the agrarian
movement, as well as Steven Hahn’s study of the roots of Populism in the American South,
particularly among yeomen farmers. This was a major work because it establishes the Southern
Populists roots. Gene Clanton’s article takes a closer look at the results of the Populist
movement. He was more concerned with hard results through congressional legislation and
asserts that the movement’s effects had been overstated because he believed almost none of their
platforms were totally accepted into law. Robert C. McMath, Jr., was also another influential
historian in the field. His work, like Goodwyn’s placed agency with farmers because of the ideas
they held. He also wished to place them back into the context of their social and economic
networks. He believed the Populists were not separated from the world, but had strong economic
and social ties, and it was out of this that the movement developed. Anne Kane and Michael
Mann look at the Populist and Progressive movements from an international perspective,
comparing them to other similar movements in European countries. This is also a point where
2
further research is needed. Jeffrey Ostler tried to break ideas about how and why the Populist
movement flourished in some areas but not in others. He tied its success more into the political
conditions of an area rather than a location’s economic hardships providing strong roots for
Populists. Jeffrey Kolnick looks at the relationship between farmers and laborers in Blue Earth
County, Minnesota. His work is important for providing a case study example of how and why
farmers and laborers would overcome differences to work together. Catherine McNicol Stock
looks at the continuity of rural radicalism and violence used by radicals over time. Hers is one of
the broadest studies in this list as it traces radicalism from before the Revolutionary War until the
1990s. Another very important work is that of Elizabeth Sanders, who seeks to connect the
modern American national state to the Populist and Progressive movement. She shows the
continuity between the Populists and the Progressives. Finally, Charles Postell examines the
ideas of the Populists. He does not focus on what they opposed though, instead he chooses to
look at what they were for and hopes by doing so to dispel the myth that they were not modern
and backwards looking people. The agrarian role in Populism was strong, but the character of
that movement and its effects are still an open debate.
Lawrence Goodwyn’s, Democratic Promise: The Populist Moment in America, will be
the first work discussed in this historiography. Goodwyn’s work is considered seminal in the
field, being the first major work written after C. Vann Woodward’s, Origins of the New South,
1877-1913. Woodward’s study is still a giant in the field; however it is the intention of this
historiography to focus on more modern studies and not just of the South, but of Populism across
the United States. Unlike Woodward, Goodwyn does not simply gloss over the Farmers’
Alliance, but sees it as essential to the movement. Their policy of cooperative efforts is seen as
vital by Goodwyn, who points out that in Nebraska where such cooperative efforts were minimal
3
or non-existent, there were no radical political objectives and they were not thinking and acting
in the same way as Populists in other states.1 Goodwyn appears to be saying that it was this
agrarian radical reform which gives the movement its character. These reforms are how
Goodwyn traces the movement to states like Kansas, Georgia, and Texas. It is in these regions
where the political movement took a far more radical edge and the cooperatives were far more
important. For Goodwyn, the Farmers’ Alliance was the backbone of the Populist movement.
As he states, “the organization that provided the foot soldiers of Populism was a multi-sectional
mass movement known as the National Farmers Alliance and Industrial Union.”2 He sees the
core of the movement as the “dream of the cooperative commonwealth” which was espoused by
farmers and others throughout the movement.3 Goodwyn’s work is more nationally focused.
The Farmers’ Alliance was present in so many states; it almost requires a national focus in order
to keep the movement in perspective. Goodwyn reveals the central role of the Farmers’ Alliance
in the movement and is important in placing the strength of the movement in the agrarian
reforms, yet he is not very forward looking to see its actual effects. For this, it is important to
step back two years to an article by Jonathan Lurie.
Lurie’s article examines what he believes to be the myth of the farmers’ power. He does
not seem to be denying the strength of the farmers’ power within the movement, which two years
later, Goodwyn will show to be considerable and what previous authors such as C. Vann
Woodward have also shown. Instead he is trying to look the strength of their political power,
which he measures in what they were able to pass during the height of their movement during
1890 to 1896. Lurie looks at several of the major reforms wanted by the agrarians including free
1
Lawrence Goodwyn, Democratic Promise: The Populist Moment in America, (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1976), xvii.
2
Ibid, xviii.
3
Ibid, xx.
4
coinage of silver, an antioption statute, regulating futures trading, and direct election of U.S.
Senators.4 To show proof that the farmers had little political power outside of the movement,
Lurie points out that of the four main issues farmers were pushing for, only the last was actually
passed an not until about twenty-five years after the period which Lurie examines.5 Lurie’s work
is far different from that of Goodwyn. Goodwyn is looking at internal politics, which show the
farmers had a great deal of power within the movement. He makes his point with the
cooperative commonwealth element. Yet Lurie is far more concerned with the results of the
movement, which he believes are not much if one is simply looking at hard results. Lurie fails to
account for other results of the movement, such as social or cultural consequences, and even
lasting political consequences for the Democratic Party. This is important because the
movement does not die in 1896. Elements are eventually absorbed into the Democratic Party
and other elements go elsewhere. Like Goodwyn, Lurie is focused on the broader national
aspects of the movement.
Though once again chronologically out of order, it is important to discuss Gene Clanton’s
article within the context of Lurie’s though he does not deal directly with Lurie. Clanton is
actually dealing with what he sees as a consensus in the field to synthesize the populist
movement into the development of progressivism and eventually liberalism. His main issue is
the opinion that Populist Party platforms had been totally accepted by the progressive
movement.6 Clanton is opposed to this statement because, “not a single Populist platform plank
(not to be confused with the attached resolutions)” were accepted in their entirety by Congress.7
4
Jonathan Lurie, “Commodities Exchanges, Agrarian ‘Political Power,’ and the Antioption Battle, 1890-1894.”
Agricultural History Vol. 48, No. 1, Farming in the Midwest, 1840-1900: A Symposium (Jan., 1974), 116.
5
Ibid.
6
Gene Clanton, “’Hayseed Socialism’ on the Hill: Congressional Populism, 1891-1895,” The Western Historical
Quarterly Vol. 15, No. 2 (Apr., 1984), 140.
7
Ibid.
5
Clanton also must deal with Goodwyn’s book. He gives a short comparison to Karel D. Bicha’s
book which was published in the same year as Goodwyn’s. He states that Bicha’s book looked
more at congressional history, while Goodwyn was focused more on cultural and social
concerns.8 He also asks the question of whose book is more successful and concludes that while
Bicha’s is unique in its look at congressional populism, it does not bring much else new to the
table. Goodwyn’s is far more successful because he shows that populism was a “democratic
phenomenon and not just a harbinger of twentieth-century liberalism.”9 But to show that
congressional populism was unsuccessful, Clanton describes what would have happened if the
Populists had been in control. For example he states that there would be a system of public
banking, with money being increased or decreased by the national government to adjust for
inflation and deflation, with a minimal interest cost.10 This does not happen, which he believes
is just one proof of his thesis that the congressional populist movement was not as successful as
previously believed. Clanton’s article follows the national outlook that Goodwyn and Lurie
ascribe too. Steven Hahn will return the examination of the movement to the South, even more
so than Goodwyn. In this respect, his work is more similar to that of Woodward’s, though Hahn
will be taking a much narrower view by focusing on yeomen farmers in Georgia.
Steven Hahn’s, The Roots of Southern Populism: Yeoman Farmers and the
Transformation of the Georgia Upcountry, 1850-1890, was intended to discuss the origins of
agrarian radicalism in the American South with a major focus on the origins of this radicalism
which culminated in the Populist movement.11 Hahn sets about filling what he sees as an
important gap in the historiography of the Populist movement in the South by using Georgia
8
Ibid, 141.
Ibid.
10
Ibid, 147.
11
Steven Hahn, The Roots of Southern Populism: Yeoman Farmers and the Transformation of the Georgia
Upcountry, 1850-1890, (New York: Oxford University Pess, 1983), vii.
9
6
yeomen farmers as a sort of case study. He believes that these farmers, specifically white
farmers, have been largely ignored by historians. As Hahn also recognized, his book is different
from most histories of the Populist movement because he starts just before the Civil War,
believing it is important to begin tracing the origins of the movement here. He is right in doing
so, because the Populist movement was not something which just appeared out of a void; like
any major political movements its history can be traced back. Hahn concludes that the Farmers’
Alliance found in the yeomen farmers a weak base. Their traditional mode of support was the
kinship ties developed between the landed and landless elements of society and it was through
this network which their shared grievances were often expressed.12 He describes these networks
as “cooperative exchanges” that relied on neighboring families and did not trust larger
organizational structures which he felt left the farmers weak against attacks from elites who
opposed their movement.13 Hahn’s work follows the growing trend of viewing the populist
movement through a social history lens. The next author, Robert C. McMath, Jr. also follows
this trend, perhaps to a greater degree.
McMath’s work is a broader synthesis of agrarian involvement in the populist movement.
Like Hahn, McMath saw the Populist’s long term development. He traces the development of
many of the reform ideas through several movements including the Greenback Party and the
Antimonopoly League.14 It was from the Lampasas Alliance and one of its members, William T.
Baggett, that the National Farmers’ Alliance and Industrial Union would be born.15 It was in
many of these earlier movements that the ideas which would later congeal into Populism were
created, and even earlier as Hahn shows. McMath’s work is not dissimilar from Goodwyn’s in
12
Ibid, 287.
Ibid, 287-288.
14
Robert C. McMath, Jr., American Populism: A Social History, 1877-1898, (New York: Hill and Wang, 1992),
13
5.
15
Ibid, 6-7.
7
that he positions the power of farmers within the Populist Party based on their reform ideas. He
hopes to connect the Populist movement with the social networks in which people lived.
McMath does not see the majority of the farmers involved with the movement as living on the
fringe in isolated pockets of the country. He instead asserts that the movement developed out of
these deep social connections.16 McMath also hopes to point out the deep economic connections
of the people involved in the movement. But he does not wish to do this on a limited scale; the
book adequately shows the connection of the broader movement in its various forms to the
people who had such deep roots in their local economic and social ties. For McMath, this
outlook does not facilitate seeing the movement as one cohesive unit, even at its peak. It is a
collection of organizations and ideas coalesced into one mass movement with shared common
goals.17 McMath is one of the major names in the field for this work but also for his previous
work which was released around the same time as Goodwyn’s. Together they have shaped the
way historians have looked at Populism. Their work focuses mainly on the social and economic
factors of Populism with less focus on the politics of the movement. They prefer to look at the
power of farmers within this mass movement and the ways in which their radicalism drove the
movement. The next article, which is co-written, will take a different approach to this already
well discussed topic of Populism.
Anne Kane and Michael Mann come from a broader international historiography of
agrarian movements, but their work is still very relevant to the agrarian movement in America.
During this time, the United States was not the only country experiencing agrarian radicalism.
Populism was not uniquely American though few of the previous authors look at the wider
politics of the movement and do not view it on an international scale. Kane and Mann look not
16
17
Ibid, 17.
Ibid.
8
just at the politics of agrarian radicalism in the US, but in countries like France, Germany,
Sweden, Austria, Hungary, and Russia, along with several others. They believe that previous
theorist have analyzed these various movements from an economic perspective. It is not the
intention of their article to take away the economic perspective as they see this as the motivating
factor behind the politics. In the section dealing with the United States, they see agrarian distress
as the motivating factor behind the farmers’ political demands, with much of this stress in the
South stemming from the destruction of the Civil War.18 They believe that after the war, smallfarmer interests took a back seat to big business and commerce within the Democratic Party,
forcing these farmers to seek relief from third-party organizations.19 Kane and Mann compare
the Southern farmers suffering at the hands of local elites to the farmers of other countries and
believe that eventually the Socialist Party would start to advocate for similar moderate agrarian
socialism in Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Oklahoma as Socialists did in France, Scandinavia
and Bavaria.20 Looking at the Populist movement from such an international scale and with
much grander political perspective is useful, but it blurs many of the important details of the
movement within the United States. Jeffrey Ostler returns this historiography to a much more
focused perspective.
Ostler’s book, Prairie Populism: The Fate of Agrarian Radicalism in Kansas, Nebraska,
and Iowa, 1880-1892, asks the question; why did Populism not take root in Iowa even though it
was strong in its neighbors, Kansas and Nebraska? Ostler is certainly not the first historian to
notice this curiosity, but he is one of the few to give it such attention. Previous explanations
have been that the economic situation in Iowa was not conducive, yet Ostler shows that Iowa’s
18
Anne Kane and Michael Mann, “A Theory of Early Twentieth-Century Agrarian Politics,” Social Science
History Vol. 16, No.3 (Autumn, 1992), 434.
19
Ibid.
20
Ibid.
9
economic state was similar to that of Kansas and Nebraska. For Ostler, the explanation is within
party politics. In Kansas and Nebraska, the Democratic Party was not a threat to the Republicans
and therefore farmers could not turn to the Democrats for aid, nor could they turn to the
Republicans. The only option open to farmers was to form a third party. In Iowa, the Democrats
were a real threat, so in order for the Republican Party to remain in power, they had to provide
some solid reforms which kept farmers moderately satisfied and making a third party
unnecessary.21 Like Steven Hahn, Ostler does not focus on the movement at its height. Ostler is
far more concerned with how the movement is formed, but does so by looking at its roots in the
Midwest, while Hahn focuses on the South. Hahn’s focus left a gap in the historiography which
Ostler has neatly filled. This makes it a crucial book, but not simply for this reason alone. If
economic conditions previously to blame for where the Populist movement took hold, then what
does Ostler’s book do to that assumption? He proves that economic conditions alone can
account for where the movement took hold. If political conditions were not also conducive and
because of the strength of the two-party system, Populism would not take hold with any strength.
Ostler’s examination is fairly narrow in focus though drawing conclusions about the wider
movement based on three states. Jeffrey Kolnick will take an even narrower view in order to
examine the relations between agrarian and urban reformers.
Jeffrey Kolnick focuses his article on Blue Earth County in Minnesota. Kolnick points
out that for many historians, Minnesota’s farmer-laborism is mainly a twentieth-century
phenomenon, though the relationship existed during the Populist movement and has made
21
Jeffrey Ostler, Prairie Populism: The Fate of Agrarian Radicalism in Kansas, Nebraska, and Iowa, 1880-1892,
(Lawrence: University of Kansas, 1993), 10.
10
important contributions to American radicalism.22 Though perhaps not as widely recognized as
work done by Goodwyn, McMath, or Ostler, Kolnick’s work on the farmer-labor dichotomy is
very important because such case-studies are what the field has been previously lacking. Ostler
and Hahn have made steps toward looking at the Populist movement on a smaller scale but they
still cover large areas and diverse relationships. When one views the work by Goodwyn and
McMath, the relationships become even more national the local networks get lost in grander
narratives. Jeffrey Kolnick brings the historian’s view back to where small changes which
collectively had national impact took place. Kolnick shows that when the Farmer-Labor alliance
formed in Blue Earth County, they were able to influence elections though not dominate.23 This
is not altogether different from the way the Populist Party influenced national elections. Even in
Blue Earth County, the key to the success of the Farmer-Labor party was the backing it received
from the Knights of Labor and the Farmers’ Alliance. The candidates were also not likely to win
elections without some form of backing from the Democrats or Republicans.24 Much of what
Kolnick discusses takes place in the 1880s but he states that farmer-labor politics would again
come to the forefront of Blue Earth County politics in 1890 and 1892.25 Kolnick follows the
trend toward the focused view of agrarian politics and also contributes to farmer-labor history. It
is articles like Kolnick’s which help to fill the smaller gaps in the historiography. But like the
previous books and articles, Kolnick’s work discusses radicalism in the context of the Populist
movement, but does not investigate radicalism itself or its more violent side.
Catherine McNicol Stock’s, Rural Radicalism: Righteous Rage in the American Grain,
seeks to answer three questions about rural radicals; “where did these angry white rural men
22
Jeffrey Kolnick, “Rural-Urban Conflict and Farmer-Labor Politics: Blue Earth County, 1885-1886” Minnesota
History Vol. 54, No. 1 (Spring, 1994), 32.
23
Ibid, 45.
24
Ibid.
25
Ibid.
11
come from? Second, what explains their contradictory politics?” and the last is why this form of
rural radicalism has seemed to overtake democratic reform in our time.26 In answering these
questions, Stock looks at rural radicalism from the Bacon’s Rebellion before the Revolutionary
War until the Oklahoma City Bombing. What she shows is that the violent aspect of agrarian
reform was not unique to the Populist movement or the Progressive movement, but that it existed
well before either of these and did not die with them, continuing into the present day. The two
areas she examines are rural producer radicalism which she defines as rural radicalism that is
usually associated with the left. This is the type of agrarian reform movements seen in the
Populist Party. The other aspect Stock deals with is vigilante violence which is used against
various types of people for different reasons. The first example she uses is that of Jim Jenkins
who kills the banker that foreclosed on his farm in 1982.27 From there she traces the culture of
vigilante violence and proposes that by showing the origins of such violence and its historical
continuity, Americans should not be so surprised when it occurs. Though the book is somewhat
short for a text covering such a broad history and despite several other weaknesses, no other
author had yet looked at the continuity of violence and ideas the way Stock did, making her book
an important marker in the history of agrarian radicalism’s role in the Populist movement.
Looking at what effect the agrarian movements have had on present day society is not new. But
Stock’s examination of the violence is, yet she does not delve far enough into the possibility of
other impacts.
Clanton wrote that the agrarian movement had less impact on the later American political
structure than previously thought. However Elizabeth Sanders does not seem to agree with this
26
Catherine McNicol Stock, Rural Radicalism: Righteous Rage in the American Grain (Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 1996), 13.
27
Ibid, 89
12
assessment and reopens the debate in Roots of Reform: Farmers, Workers, and the American
State, 1877-1917. Her overall thesis is that the agrarian movement was the most important for
the creation of the American national state. The agrarian movement on the periphery was critical
for the creation of a stronger central state during the Populist and Progressive era was the key.
For her, the previous scholarship on the political interactions of the farmers’ and laborers’
movements and their effect on the American political structure had been lacking.28 To prove her
thesis, Sanders decided to move away from private correspondence and association archives
which have been used extensively in other studies.29 Instead, she bases her work off the public
positions taken by political representatives of labor, farmers and capital.30 Sanders also shows
how agrarian radicalism did not die in 1896. She asserts that agrarian radicalism of the 1870s
through 1890s were the basis for that legislative victories of the Progressive movement.31 One of
the evidences pointed to early on in her discussion of the continuity of agrarian radicalism is the
resurgence of the Grange in the early twentieth-century. The movement for this organization
was not dead and managed to gain members even after the agrarian movement was supposed to
have died.32 Sanders work proves to be one of the most significant histories of the agrarian
movement since Goodwyn revived discussion on the Populist movement in 1976.
As Charles Postell pointed out, much had been said about what the Populist movement
opposed and what they had been accused of being. Populists had been called reactionary and unmodern, looking to a non-existent past which had been lost and needed to be recaptured. Postell
took issue with this concept of what a Populist was. This was the image created by historians
28
Elizabeth Sanders, Roots of Reform; Farmers, Workers, and the American State, 1877-1917 (Chicago: The
University of Chicago Press, 1999), 2.
29
Ibid, 3.
30
Ibid.
31
Ibid, 149.
32
Ibid.
13
and opponents of Populists alike. Instead, he hoped to look at what the Populists were for and
how they were modern.33 Like other studies, Postell chooses to look at Populism across a broad
spectrum on a national level, so in this respect, he does not break with previous studies. And like
Sanders, Postell does sees continuity between the Populist movement of the 1890s and the
Progressive movement of the early twentieth-century. This continuity helps show that the
Populists were not backwards looking, but forward-minded individuals looking toward the future
with hope. He also takes away some of the connotation which the term modern can infer. He
does not necessarily mean it as good, for many Populists were staunch racists and he states the
term does not mean they were more modern than anyone else and nor does he wish to say that all
rural people “shared Populists’ modern sensibility.”34 Postell also sets out to create a study about
how Populists engaged power and interest, and their fight against what they perceived to be evils
which can arise in capitalism.35
Postell’s is the most recent study and reflects the scholarship which came before. The
continuity of the movement after 1896 was first reflected in the work of Stock and Sanders. But
much of the more recent literature was made possible by Goodwyn whose work has influenced
almost every author. Each of these studies has examined a different aspect of the Populist
movement and each brings its own strengths and weaknesses. After Goodwyn’s seminal work,
Steven Hahn writes his book tracing the history of the movement in the South to the yeomen
farmers. Jonathan Lurie and Gene Clanton make their studies of the political aspect of the
movement and what it would mean for America, though their theories about the effects the
movement would have would later be overturned by Elizabeth Sanders’ work. The
33
Charles Postell, The Populist Vision (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), vii-viii.
Ibid, 9.
35
Ibid, 10.
34
14
historiography has so far covered the political, economic, and social factors of the Populist
movement. Studies such as Jeffrey Kolnick’s have looked at the topic from a very focused point
of view, while others such as Charles Postell’s have examined the movement on a national scale.
Kane and Mann had the only study in this list which looked at the movement from an
international point of view. It would seem this is the direction the historiography should head.
Daniel T. Rodgers does an impressive study to dispel ideas about American exceptionalism in
regards to Progressive thought, so it would seem that such a study may be warranted for the
Populist movement. There is already a wide historiography concerning Populist movements in
other countries, though these may have taken on different forms. It is still important to see what
continuities might exist and to what degree such connections were present. More work is also
needed to examine the continuity of Populist and Progressive ideas, though Postell and Sanders
provide excellent studies and would undoubtedly be the starting point of any such research.
While important, these books are by no means definitive and therefore more work is needed to
fully answer the questions they have raised.
15
Bibliography
Books
Goodwyn, Lawrence. Democratic Promise: The Populist Moment in America. New York:
Oxford University Press, 1976.
Hahn, Steven. The Roots of Southern Populism: Yeoman Farmers and the Transformation of
the Georgia Upcountry, 1850-1890. New York: Oxford University Press, 1983.
McMath, Jr., Robert C. American Populism: A Social History, 1877-1898. New York: Hill and
Wang, 1992.
Ostler, Jeffrey. Prairie Populism: The Fate of Agrarian Radicalism in Kansas, Nebraska, and
Iowa, 1880-1892. Lawrence: University of Kansas, 1993.
Stock, Catherine McNicol. Rural Radicalism: Righteous Rage in the American Grain. Ithaca:
Cornell University Press, 1996.
Sanders, Elizabeth. Roots of Reform: Farmers, Workers, and the American State, 1877-1917.
Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1999.
Postell, Charles. The Populist Vision. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
Articles
Lurie, Jonathan. “Commodities Exchanges, Agrarian ‘Political Power,’ and the Antioption
Battle, 1890-1894.” Agricultural History Vol. 48, No. 1, Farming in the Midwest, 18401900: A Symposium (Jan., 1974), pp. 115-125.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/3741422 (accessed October 7, 2010).
Clanton, Gene. “’Hayseed Socialism’ on the Hill: Congressional Populism, 1891-1895.” The
Western Historical Quarterly Vol. 15, No. 2 (Apr., 1984), pp. 139-162.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/968514 (accessed October 10, 2010).
Kane, Anne and Michael Mann. “A Theory of Early Twentieth-Century Agrarian Politics.”
Social Science History Vol. 16, No. 3 (Autumn, 1992), pp. 421-454.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/1171390 (accessed October 8, 2010).
Kolnick, Jeffrey. “Rural-Urban Conflict and Farmer-Labor Politics: Blue Earth County, 18851886.” Minnesota History Vol. 54, No. 1 (Spring, 1994), pp. 32-45.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/20187855 (Accessed October 7, 2010)