North American Farm Alliance
In 1983, as the nation's farm crisis deepened, Hansen was elected to serve as the founding chairman of the North American Farm Alliance, a farm protest organization that advocated a return to Roosevelt's New Deal farm policies. The group also sought to construct an active coalition between family farmers and other groups perceived as disenfranchised or marginalized in American life. The group's coalition building included outreach to environmentalists, civil rights organizations, the urban poor, and farmers in developing countries.
In August 1983, Hansen and other family farm leaders met with Jesse Jackson in Washington, D.C. during the 20th anniversary of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. When Jackson announced his presidential candidacy a short while later, Hansen became his chief adviser on agricultural policy. Against the advice of many of his advisors, who told him it would be futile to court rural farmers, Jackson adopted many of Hansen's suggestions.
Jackson attended numerous farm protest rallies and his electoral performance in rural counties often surpassed expectations. At the 1984 Democratic National Convention, Hansen was asked by Jackson to make one of the three speeches formally entering his name into nomination as a candidate. The other nominating speeches were made by future Congresswoman Maxine Waters and Washington, D.C. mayor Marion Barry. In 1985, Hansen traveled to Africa with Jackson, meeting with Ministers of Agriculture while Jackson met with heads of state. In 1988, he again worked with Jackson on his presidential campaign. He attended the 1988 Democratic National Convention as an Alternate Delegate and contributed substantially to that year's platform debate on agricultural policy.
In addition to his role as President of the North American Farm Alliance, Hansen also served as vice president of the National Save the Family Farm Coalition. In 1985, Hansen was an active supporter of the first Farm Aid concert, and was heavily involved with the crafting of Farm Aid's political message and the distribution of the financial proceeds from the first concert's ticket sales.
Throughout the 1980s, Hansen was a prominent spokesman for the concerns of family farmers, often speaking at rallies, protest actions, and with media representatives. He was featured prominently in publications ranging from USA Today, to The New York Times, to Ms. Magazine. As President of the North American Farm Alliance, his primary responsibility was communications outreach and coalition building. An articulate speaker, Hansen's message reached audiences throughout the United States and around the world.
Read more about this topic: Merle Hansen
Famous quotes containing the words north american, north, american, farm and/or alliance:
“Civilization does not engross all the virtues of humanity: she has not even her full share of them. They flourish in greater abundance and attain greater strength among many barbarous people. The hospitality of the wild Arab, the courage of the North American Indian, and the faithful friendships of some of the Polynesian nations, far surpass any thing of a similar kind among the polished communities of Europe.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“The North has no interest in the particular Negro, but talks of justice for the whole. The South has not interest, and pretends none, in the mass of Negroes but is very much concerned about the individual.”
—Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)
“I think that Richard Nixon will go down in history as a true folk hero, who struck a vital blow to the whole diseased concept of the revered image and gave the American virtue of irreverence and skepticism back to the people.”
—William Burroughs (b. 1914)
“The shifting islands! who would not be willing that his house should be undermined by such a foe! The inhabitant of an island can tell what currents formed the land which he cultivates; and his earth is still being created or destroyed. There before his door, perchance, still empties the stream which brought down the material of his farm ages before, and is still bringing it down or washing it away,—the graceful, gentle robber!”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Racism as a form of skin worship, and as a sickness and a pathological anxiety for America, is so great, until the poor whites—rather than fighting for jobs or education—fight to remain pink and fight to remain white. And therefore they cannot see an alliance with people that they feel to be inherently inferior.”
—Jesse Jackson (b. 1941)