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This short-lived tenant farmers' revolt broke out in three counties along Oklahoma's South Canadian River in August 1917. Ostensibly an uprising against World War I and the Conscription Act, the Green Corn Rebellion actually emerged from a series of long-standing grievances tenant farmers held against local landowners, businessmen, and state and local authorities, especially over the increasing consolidation of agricultural land by a few wealthy landholders. At the time of the rebellion, more than half of Oklahoma's farmers were tenants, many of whom had been forced into that condition by rampant land speculation and outright fraud.
In the early years of the twentieth century,
large numbers of tenants and small farmers
sought help from the state's Socialist Party and
its affiliated organizations, such as the Renters
Union. While the Socialists called for expanding
the public domain, enacting a graduated
land tax, and creating a cooperative marketing
system, some tenants grew frustrated with the
political process and turned to night riding or
to direct action techniques borrowed from the
Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). But
the IWW itself rejected the tenant farmers because
the union recruited only wageworkers.
The tenants instead joined another organization,
the Working Class Union (WCU),
based in Van Buren, Arkansas. The WCU locals
in Oklahoma soon claimed 35,000 members, a
questionable number. wcu membership rose
with the collapse of cotton prices at the start
of World War I, then grew again with opposition
to a 1915 cattle-dipping campaign intended
to check the spread of Texas fever.
Charging that the chemicals used in the treatment
harmed livestock, wcu members dynamited
dipping vats and destroyed the property
of local officials. But the organization became
inactive after cotton prices rose in 1916.
The WCU revived in 1917 after American entry
into World War I. Both opposition to the
war and the old grievances simmered throughout
the summer of 1917. In early August hundreds
of men gathered at the Sasakwa, Oklahoma,
farm of John Spears, an aging Socialist,
to plan a march on Washington to end the war.
They intended to live on barbecued beef and
roasted green corn, the latter giving the rebellion
its name. On August 3 rebels started
burning bridges and cutting telegraph lines,
but hastily organized posses soon halted the
rebellion. Three men were killed and more
than 400 others were arrested. Of those, 150
were convicted and received federal prison
terms of up to ten years.
In the wake of the rebellion, the state Socialist
Party disbanded. State and federal authorities
used the uprising as a means to suppress
the IWW, which had taken no part in the
rebellion.