Government Aid to Farmers
This map from the 1920 Census of Agriculture highlights the importance of agriculture in Ohio before the Great Depression, when many people relied on farms for employment and food.
Agriculture remained an important facet of the economies of the United States and Ohio through the Civil War and World War I. In the United States, both cities and rural communities were damaged by the Great Depression and well as the Dust Bowl (1931-1939). Wayne County, a community relying on agriculture as a main part of the economy, did not escape economic devastation. In response to the Depression, many farmers attempted to produce more crops to pay off debts and purchase goods, but this resulted in surpluses, which exasperated the problem.1
Even before the twentieth century, American political culture had been shifting toward the modern liberal state, which included increased governmental influence in Americans’ lives. Economic hardships caused by the Great Depression only “sealed the fate” of the existence of the modern welfare state in the United States.2 Agriculture could not escape governmental influence. In fact, many Americans, including farmers, felt that a more interventionist government would help rehabilitate rural areas.
This map from the 1920 Census of Agriculture shows that a lareg portion of Ohio's land was used for agriculture before the Great Depression.
In the 1930s, Congress and the Roosevelt Administration enacted New Deal reforms to rehabilitate rural economies through conservation efforts and with efforts to control surpluses.3 While economies improved and the New Deal Era ended, federal agricultural policy has continued.
Today, government subsidies change each year depending on new legislation and market prices. Just like new Ohioan farmers in 1803, Wayne County farmers view themselves as individuals and independent from governmental influence. However, new Ohioan farmers relied on the federal government to provide land and many Wayne County farmers currently rely on the federal government to provide subsidies. Of course, modern farmers must rely on these subsidies as a part of their income. Farming, while necessary, isn’t a profitable profession.
Carl Redick, a farmer in Wooster, noted in 2011 that farm subsidies, which were decreasing made up only a small portion of his income.4
“I wish the government would get out of farming,” he added.
“Sure you wanna say that on tape?” Carla Redick, his wife, asked, laughing.
Mr. Redick clarified: he doesn’t like the stipulations that come with government subsidies nor does he want to rely on the government every year to provide farmers with enough money.
The Redicks, as well as many other Wayne County farmers, lack trust in the federal government mostly because of the regulations placed on them by politicians, most of whom have never farmed. Despite viewing themselves as independent, farmers continue to depend on aid from the government, just as Ohioans did for land 200 years ago.
1 Rachel Louise Moran, “Consuming Relief: Food Stamps and the New Welfare of the New Deal,” The Journal of American History 97, no. 4 (2011): 1004.
2 Sarah T. Phillips, This Land, This Nation: Conservation, Rural America, and the New Deal, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 2.
3 Ibid, 2-3.
4 Carl and Carla Redick, “Oral history interview with Carl Redick, Wayne County farmer, and his wife, Carla,” interview by Morgan Greer and Lindsey Bowman, December 4, 2011, College of Wooster Open Works, 8.