The Southern Tenant Farmers Union and Depression Politics

Abstract

A small group of white and black men from near Tyronza, Arkansas, formed the pioneer local of the Southern Tenant Farmers Union in July 1934. The original purpose was to protest the treatment of sharecroppers on the plantation of Hiram Norcross. The organization grew, however, and began to spread, first throughout the rich delta land of eastern Arkansas and then to neighboring states, bringing broad objections against the often near inhuman treatment of small tenant farmers, sharecroppers, and farm laborers. Members of the STFU were particularly incensed at the effect of the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933, which seemed not only to be bringing them no benefits but to be driving large numbers of them from the land.1 The union soon aroused the enmity of planters and businessmen. Local officials harassed organizers, and when this tactic failed, a campaign of violence followed. The organization might well have collapsed except for the moral and financial support of the Socialist party. Norman Thomas served almost as a patron of the STFU from