Politics and Production Control: American Farmers and the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938

Throughout the 1930s, the Roosevelt administration enacted numerous federal programs under the umbrella of the New Deal; among these was a series of agriculture regulations designed improve the plight of the American farmer. In 1936, the Supreme Court invalidated the earliest of these programs, the 1934 Agricultural Adjustment Act, and two years after that decision, Roosevelt called a special session of Congress to enact replacement legislation for the earlier law. The resulting Agricultural Adjustment Act and Administration proved highly controversial and farmers from the upper Midwest to the deepest tip of Texas met this plan with drastically different reactions which ranged from open rebellion and lawsuits on one end, to joyous compliance on the other. This study focuses primarily on the political, regional, and economic differences that produced these disparate responses and argues that such reactions resulted chiefly from the degree of economic hardship experienced in any given region. Cotton farmers supported the law because they faced extreme economic distress from massive overproduction. Conversely, Midwestern corn farmers, who enjoyed greater economic prosperity, expressed ideological opposition to the law they found financially unnecessary.;Chapter one of this work provides an in-depth analysis of the current literature in the field of New Deal agricultural legislation. The controversial nature of the act prompted reactionary and polemical studies almost immediately following its enactment. These works began with Anna Rochester's Why Farmers are Poor, which took a sharply negative view of the AAA for not doing enough to promote the interests of the small farmer.* Subsequent works embraced varying interpretations of the New Deal but, until recently, few studies examined the perspectives of the "dirt farmers" themselves. Contemporary scholarship erupted in 2002 with a host of new studies printed that year. Contrary to Rochester's argument that the legislation fell short in achieving its goal, Jean Choate presented a disapproving picture of such programs, which she suggested went too far in attempting to secure stability and prosperity for the American farmer. Choate's Disputed Ground (2002) discussed the major opposition groups to New Deal Agricultural programs with every organization featured in its own chapter.* Through the eyes of these groups, Choate worked to reveal a disapproving public who wanted simply to be let alone by their government. Another example of these new works included Michael Johnston Grant's work, Down and Out on the Family Farm: Rural Rehabilitation in the Great Plains, 1929-1945.* Grant's book pioneered the comparative case study approach embraced here. He selected a set of states grouped along regional boundaries and used the responses of those farmers to paint a local picture of the AAA. A thorough discussion of Grant's work and its impact on Politics and Production Control can be found in chapter one.;Following the analysis of secondary sources, chapters two through four each examine a single state and the responses of the farmers in those areas to the Agricultural Adjustment Administration. Chapter two, "A Thankful Texas," reveals the mindset of cotton farmers in the largest cotton producing state in the nation. It demonstrates their great economic need at the time and uncovers some of the unique challenges faced by Texas growers which occasionally put them at odds with their colleagues in other states. "Oklahoma Optimism" studies Sooner state farmers in much the same way but provides examples of some marked ideological differences between them and their neighbors to the south. Both Oklahoma and Texas cotton farmers embraced the 1938 farm bill but each did so with an emphasis on the individualized interests of their own farmer populations.;Chapter four, "Revolt in the Corn Belt," offers a sharp contrast with the first two case studies. It examines a region that not only refused to embrace the legislation but waged an all out war against the program. This discussion of Illinois farmers illuminates the controversial and divisive nature of the AAA and provides additional insight into some farmers' ideology of New Deal opposition. Corn growers at the time enjoyed higher crop prices than their counterparts in cotton and thus comfortably opposed the farm bill based on their commitment to freedom and their demand for fairness in the administration of federal regulations. They drifted away from this position, however, when they began to understand the degree to which they could benefit economically by designing and cooperating with alternative federal programs.;The final chapter of this work places each of the case study states in historical context with one another and offers an expanded analysis of their similarities and differences. It demonstrates the impact of a region's economic situation on that region's response to the AAA and highlights the differences present between cotton and corn farmers that led to their unique reactions.;*Anna Rochester, Why Farmers are Poor (New York: International Publishers Co.), 1940. *Jean Choate, Disputed Ground: Farm Groups that Opposed the "ew Deal Agricultural Program (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland and Co., 2002). *Michael Johnston Grant, Down and Out on the Family Farm: Rura...