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In the early decades of the United States, the agrarian(土地的) movement promoted the
farmer as society's hero. In the minds of agrarian thinkers and writers, the
farmer was a person on whose well-being the health of the new country depended.
The period between the Revolution, which ended in 1783, and the Civil War,
which ended in 1865, was the age of the farmer in the United States. Agrarian
philosophers, represented most eloquently by Thomas Jefferson, celebrated
farmers extravagantly for their supposed centrality in a good society, their
political virtue, and their Superior morality. And virtually all policy makers,
whether they subscribed to the tenets of the philosophy held by Jefferson or
not, recognized agriculture as the key component of the American economy.
Consequently, government at all levels worked to encourage farmers as a social
group and agriculture as economic enterprise.
Both the national and state governments developed transportation
infrastructure, building canals, roads, bridges, and railroads, deepening
harbors, and removing obstructions from navigable streams. The national
government imported plant and animal varieties and launched exploring
expeditions into prospective farmlands in the West. In addition, government
trade policies facilitated the exporting of agricultural products.
For their part, farmers seemed to meet the social expectations agrarian
philosophers had for them, as their broader horizons and greater self-respect,
both products of the Revolution, were reflected to some degree in their
behavior. Farmers seemed to become more scientific, joining agricultural
societies and reading the farm newspapers that sprang up throughout the
country. They began using improved implements, tried new crops and pure animal
breeds, and became more receptive to modern theories of soil improvement.
They also responded to inducements by national and state governments.
Farmers streamed to the West, filling frontier lands with stunning rapidity.
But farmers responded less to the expectations of agrarians and government
inducements than to growing market opportunities. European demand for food from
the United States seemed insatiable. War, industrialization, and urbanization
all kept demand high in Europe. United States cities and industries grew as
well; even industries not directly related to farming thrived because of the
market, money, and labor that agriculture provided.