{"product_id":"9780807867112","title":"The Farmer's Benevolent Trust: Law and Agricultural Cooperation in Industrial America, 1865-1945","description":"Americans have always regarded farming as a special calling, one\u003cbr\u003eimbued with the Jeffersonian values of individualism and self-\u003cbr\u003esufficiency. As Victoria Saker Woeste demonstrates, farming's\u003cbr\u003ecultural image continued to shape Americans' expectations of\u003cbr\u003erural society long after industrialization radically transformed\u003cbr\u003ethe business of agriculture. Even as farmers enthusiastically\u003cbr\u003eembraced cooperative marketing to create unprecedented industry-\u003cbr\u003ewide monopolies and control prices, they claimed they were simply\u003cbr\u003epreserving their traditional place in society. In fact, the new\u003cbr\u003elegal form of cooperation far outpaced judicial and legislative\u003cbr\u003edevelopments at both the state and federal levels, resulting in a\u003cbr\u003elegal and political struggle to redefine the place of agriculture\u003cbr\u003ein the industrial market.\u003cbr\u003e     Woeste shows that farmers were adept at both borrowing such\u003cbr\u003elegal forms as the corporate trust for their own purposes and\u003cbr\u003eobtaining legislative recognition of the new cooperative style.\u003cbr\u003eIn the process, however, the first rule of capitalism--every\u003cbr\u003eperson for him- or herself--trumped the traditional principle of\u003cbr\u003ecooperation. After 1922, state and federal law wholly endorsed\u003cbr\u003ecooperation's new form. Indeed, says Woeste, because of its\u003cbr\u003ecorporate roots, this model of cooperation fit so neatly with the\u003cbr\u003eregulatory paradigms of the first half of the twentieth century\u003cbr\u003ethat it became an essential policy of the modern administrative\u003cbr\u003estate.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"The University of North Carolina Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47129277202672,"sku":"9780807867112","price":29.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9780807867112_p0.jpg?v=1763739960","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9780807867112","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}