The Granger Laws and the Granger Movement

The Granger Laws and the Granger Movement The Granger laws were a group of laws enacted by the legislature of the Midwestern U.S. states off Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois in the late 1860s and early 1870s after the American Civil War. Promoted by the Granger Movement organized by a group of farmers belonging to the National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry, the Granger Laws were intended to regulate rapidly rising transport and storage fees charged by railroads and grain elevator companies. As the source of extreme aggravation to the powerful railroad monopolies, the Granger Laws led to several important U.S. Supreme Court cases, highlighted by Munn v. Illinois and Wabash v. Illinois. The legacy of the Granger Movement remains alive today in the form of the National Grange organization.   The Granger movement, the Granger Laws, and the modern Grange stand as evidence of the great importance America’s leaders have historically placed on farming. â€Å"I think our governments will remain virtuous for many centuries; as long as they are chiefly agricultural.† – Thomas Jefferson Colonial Americans used word â€Å"grange† as they had in England to refer to a farmhouse and its associated outbuildings. The term itself comes from the Latin word for grain, grÄ num. In the British Isles, farmers were often referred to as â€Å"grangers.† The Granger Movement: The Grange is Born The Granger movement was a coalition of American farmers mainly in Midwestern and Southern states that worked to increase farming profits in the years following the American Civil War. The Civil War had not been kind to farmers. The few that had managed to buy land and machinery had gone deeply in debt to do so. Railroads, which had become regional monopolies, were privately owned and entirely unregulated. As a result, the railroads were free to charge farmers excessive fares to transport their crops to market. Vanishing income along with the human tragedies of the war among farming families had left much of American agriculture in a dismal state of disarray. In 1866, President Andrew Johnson sent U.S. Department of Agriculture official Oliver Hudson Kelley to assess the postwar condition of agriculture in the South. Shocked by what he found, Kelley in 1867 founded the National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry; an organization he hoped would unite Southern and Northern farmers in a cooperative effort to modernize farming practices. In 1868, the nation’s first Grange, Grange No. 1, was founded in Fredonia, New York. While first established mainly for educational and social purposes, the local granges also served as political forums through which farmers protested the constantly increasing prices for transporting and storing their products. The granges succeeded in reducing some of their costs through the construction of cooperative regional crop storage facilities as well as grain elevators, silos, and mills. However, cutting transportation costs would require legislation regulating the massive railroad industry conglomerates; legislation that became known as the â€Å"Granger laws.† The Granger Laws Since the U.S. Congress would not enact federal antitrust laws until 1890, the Granger movement had to look to their state legislatures for relief from the pricing practices of the railroad and grain storage companies. In 1871, due largely to an intense lobbying effort organized by local granges, the state of Illinois enacted a law regulating railroads and grain storage companies by setting maximum rates they could charge farmers for their services. The states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Iowa soon passed similar laws. Fearing a loss in profits and power, the railroads and grain storage companies challenged the Granger laws in court. The so-called â€Å"Granger cases† eventually reached the U.S. Supreme Court in 1877. The court’s decisions in these cases set legal precedents that would forever change U.S. business and industrial practices. Munn v. Illinois In 1877, Munn and Scott, a Chicago-based grain storage company, was found guilty of violating the Illinois Granger law. Munn and Scott appealed the conviction claiming the state’s Granger law was an unconstitutional seizure of its property without due process of law in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. After the Illinois Supreme Court upheld the Granger law, the case of Munn v. Illinois was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. In a 7-2 decision written by Chief Justice Morrison Remick Waite, the Supreme Court ruled that businesses serving the public interest, such as those that store or transport food crops, could be regulated by the government. In his opinion, Justice Waite wrote that government regulation of private business is right and proper â€Å"when such regulation becomes necessary for the public good.† Through this ruling, the case of Munn v. Illinois set an important precedent that essentially created the foundation for the modern federal regulatory process. Wabash v. Illinois and the Interstate Commerce Act Almost a decade after Munn v. Illinois the Supreme Court would severely limit the rights of the states to control interstate commerce through its ruling in the 1886 case of Wabash, St. Louis Pacific Railway Company v. Illinois. In the so-called â€Å"Wabash Case,† the Supreme Court found Illinois’ Granger law as it applied to the railroads to be unconstitutional since it sought to control interstate commerce, a power reserved to the federal government by the Tenth Amendment. In response to the Wabash Case, Congress enacted the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. Under the act, the railroads became the first American industry subject to federal regulations and were required to inform the federal government of their rates. In addition, the act banned the railroads from charging different haul rates based on distance. To enforce the new regulations, the act also created the now-defunct Interstate Commerce Commission, the first independent government agency. Wisconsin’s Ill-Fated Potter Law Of all the Granger laws enacted, Wisconsin’s â€Å"Potter Law† was by far the most radical. While the Granger laws of Illinois, Iowa, and Minnesota assigned the regulation of railroad fares and grain storage prices to independent administrative commissions, Wisconsin’s Potter Law empowered the state legislature itself to set those prices. The law resulted in a state-sanctioned system of price fixing which allowed little if any profits for the railroads. Seeing no profits in doing so, the railroads stopped building new routes or extending existing tracks. The lack of railroad construction sent Wisconsin’s economy into a depression forcing the state legislature to repeal the Potter Law in 1867. The Modern Grange Today the National Grange remains an influential force in American agriculture and a vital element in community life. Now, as in 1867, the Grange advocates for the causes of farmers in areas including global free trade and domestic farm policy.   Ã¢â‚¬Ëœ According to its mission statement, the Grange works through fellowship, service, and legislation to provide individuals and families with opportunities to develop to their highest potential in order to build stronger communities and states, as well as a stronger nation.    Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the Grange is a non-partisan organization that supports only policy and legislation, never political parties or individual candidates. While originally founded to serve  farmers and agricultural interests, the modern Grange advocates for a wide variety of issues, and its membership is open to anyone. â€Å"Members come from all over small towns, large cities, farmhouses, and penthouses,† states the Grange. With organizations in more than 2,100 communities in 36 states, local Grange Halls continue to serve as vital centers of rural life for many farming communities.

Definition and Examples of Anaphora in Rhetoric

Definition and Examples of Anaphora in Rhetoric Anaphora is a rhetorical term for the repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses. By building toward a climax, anaphora can create a strong emotional effect. Consequently, this figure of speech is often found in polemical writings and passionate oratory, perhaps most famously in Dr. Martin Luther Kings I Have a Dream speech. Classical scholar George A. Kennedy compares anaphora to a series of hammer blows in which the repetition of the word both connects and reinforces the successive thoughts (New Testament Interpretation Through Rhetorical Criticism, 1984).  Ã‚   Examples and Observations We learned to diagram sentences with the solemn precision of scientists articulating chemical equations. We learned to read by reading aloud, and we learned to spell by spelling aloud.(Joyce Carol Oates, District School #7: Niagara County, New York. Faith of a Writer: Life, Craft, Art. HarperCollins, 2003)I needed a drink, I needed a lot of life insurance, I needed a vacation, I needed a home in the country. What I had was a coat, a hat, and a gun.(Raymond Chandler, Farewell, My Lovely, 1940)It rained on his lousy tombstone, and it rained on the grass on his stomach. It rained all over the place.(Holden Caulfield in J.D. Salingers The Catcher in the Rye, 1951)Anaphora will repeat an opening phrase or word;Anaphora will pour it into a mould (absurd)!Anaphora will cast each subsequent opening;Anaphora will last until its tiring.(John Hollander, Rhymes Reason: A Guide to English Verse. Yale University Press, 1989)Here comes the shadow not looking where it is going,And the whole night wi ll fall; it is time.Here comes the little wind which the hourDrags with it everywhere like an empty wagon through leaves.Here comes my ignorance shuffling after themAsking them what they are doing.(W.S. Merwin, Sire. The Second Four Books of Poems. Copper Canyon Press, 1993) Sir Walter Raleigh. Good food. Good cheer. Good times.(slogan of the Sir Walter Raleigh Inn Restaurant, Maryland)We saw the bruised children of these fathers clump onto our school bus, we saw the abandoned children huddle in the pews at church, we saw the stunned and battered mothers begging for help at our doors.(Scott Russell Sanders, Under the Influence, 1989)Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.(Rick Blaine in Casablanca)We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.(Winston Churchill, speech to the House of Commons, June 4, 1940)Let both sides explore what problems unite us instead of belaboring those problems which divide us. Let both sides, for the first time, formulate serious and precise proposals for the inspection and control of arms, and bring the absolute power to destroy other nations under the absolute control of all nations.Let both sides seek to invoke the wonders of science instead of its terrors. Together let us explore the stars, conquer the deserts, eradicate disease, tap the ocean depths, and encourage the arts and commerce.Let both sides unite to heed, in all corners of the earth, the command of Isaiah - to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free.(President John Kennedy, Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961) But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so weve come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.(Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., I Have a Dream, 1963)Its the hope of slaves sitting around a fire singing freedom songs; the hope of immigrants setting out for distant shores; the hope of a young naval lieutenant bravely patrolling the Mekong Delta; the hope of a millworkers son who dares to defy the odds; the hope of a skinny kid with a funny name who believes that America has a place for him, too.(Barack Obama, The Audacity of Hope, July 27, 2004)In school, I am a luckless goose girl, friendless and forlorn. In P.S. 71 I carry, weighty as a cloak, the ineradicable knowledge of my scandal - I am cross-eyed, dumb, an imbecile in arithmetic; in P.S. 71 I am publicly shamed in Assembly because I am caught not singing Christmas carols; in P.S. 71 I am repeatedly accused of deicide. But in the Park View Pharmacy, in the winter dusk, branches blackening in the park across the road, I am driving in rapture through the Violet Fairy Book and the Yellow Fairy Book, insubstantial chariots snatched from the box in the mud.(Cynthia Ozick, A Drugstore in Winter. Art and Ardor, 1983) Whatever failures I have known, whatever errors I have committed, whatever follies I have witnessed in public and private life, have been the consequences of action without thought.(attributed to Bernard Baruch)Brylcreem, a little dabll do ya,Brylcreem, youll look so debonair!Brylcreem, the galsll all pursue ya!Theyll love to get their fingers in your hair.(Advertising jingle, 1950s)I want her to live. I want her to breathe. I want her to aerobicize.(Weird Science, 1985)Im not afraid to die. Im not afraid to live. Im not afraid to fail. Im not afraid to succeed. Im not afraid to fall in love. Im not afraid to be alone. Im just afraid I might have to stop talking about myself for five minutes.(Kinky Friedman, When the Cats Away, 1988)In Gods name, you people are the real thing. We are the illusion!So turn off your television sets. Turn them off now! Turn them off right now! Turn them off and leave them off. Turn them off right in the middle of this sentence Im speaking to you now.Turn them off!(Peter Finch as television anchorman Howard Beale in Network, 1976) Anaphora in Dr. Kings Letter From a Birmingham Jail But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick, brutalize and even kill your black brothers and sisters with impunity; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she cant go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her little eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see the depressing cloud of inferiority begin to form in her little mental sky, and see her begin to distort her little personality by unconsciously developing a bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son asking in agonizing pathos: Da ddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?; when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading white and colored; when your first name becomes nigger and your middle name becomes boy (however old you are) and your last name becomes John, and when your wife and mother are never given the respected title Mrs.; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance never quite knowing what to expect next, and plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of nobodiness; then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait.(Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter From a Birmingham Jail, April 16, 1963. I Have a Dream: Writings and Speeches That Changed the World, ed. by James M. Washington. HarperCollins, 1992) Anaphora in President Franklin Roosevelts Second Inaugural Address But here is the challenge to our democracy: In this nation, I see tens of millions of its citizens - a substantial part of its whole population - who at this very moment are denied the greater part of what the very lowest standards of today call the necessities of life.I see millions of families trying to live on incomes so meager that the pall of family disaster hangs over them day by day.I see millions whose daily lives in city and on farm continue under conditions labeled indecent by a so-called polite society half a century ago.I see millions denied education, recreation, and the opportunity to better their lot and the lot of their children.I see millions lacking the means to buy the products of farm and factory and by their poverty denying work and productiveness to many other millions.I see one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished.But it is not in despair that I paint you that picture. I paint it for you in hope - because the nation, seeing and understanding the injustice in it, proposes to paint it out.(Franklin D. Roosevelt, Second Inaugural Address, January 20, 1937) The Lighter Side of Anaphora I dont like you sucking around, bothering our citizens, Lebowski. I dont like your jerk-off name. I dont like your jerk-off face. I dont like your jerk-off behavior, and I dont like you, jerk-off.(Policeman in The Big Lebowski, 1998)