Colored Farmers' National Alliance and Cooperative Union

Colored Farmers' National Alliance and Cooperative Union was formed in 1886 in Texas. Despite the fact that both black and white farmers faced great difficulties due to the rising price of farming and the decreasing profits which were coming from farming, the protective organization known as the Southern Farmers' Alliance did not allow black farmers to join. A group of black farmers decided to organize their own alliance, to fill their need. The organization rapidly spread across the Southern United States, peaking with a membership of 1.2 million in 1891.

The Farmers' Alliance was founded in central Texas in 1877, through the efforts of farmers at self-protection from 'land sharks,' merchants, horse thieves, and cattle ranchers. The constitution of the initial Texas order, drafted in 1882, denied membership to blacks on the grounds that the Alliance was a social organization "where we meet with out wives and daughters." But, leaders of the Alliance realized that it was impossible to establish a profitable agricultural system while a large black population served as potential competitors and a source of cheap, exploitable labor.

The Colored Farmers National Alliance and Cooperative Union was founded in Houston County, Texas on December 11, 1886, on the farm of R.M. Humphrey, a white Alliance member and Baptist missionary. The alliance elected J. J. Shuffer as its first president. Although the orders' charter barred whites from membership, Humphrey was elected honorary superintendent. As increasingly repressive Black Codes were enacted, Humphrey served as a "white spokesman who could openly express militancy and have access that would be denied to blacks." By 1888 the alliance received a charter from the US Federal Government. They quickly after began to spread and found chapters in different states across the South. In 1890 they merged with a rival alliance, the National Colored Alliance. They also absorbed the Colored Agricultural Wheels in Arkansas, western Tennessee and Alabama. By 1890, the Colored Farmers' Alliance claimed over 1,200,000 members.

The order’s statement of principals was in the vein of Booker T. Washington, promoting economic self-sufficiency and racial ‘uplift’ through vocational training, at the expense of demands for political equality. They tried to educate the farmers about better farming tactics and techniques, and set up exchanges in the ports of Norfolk, Charleston, Mobile, New Orleans and Houston, where members could go in order to purchase discounted items required for their farming. They advocated members' avoiding debt through hard work and sacrifice, and suggested goals such as home ownership. They collaborated with the white Farmers' Alliance in opposing the Louisiana State Lottery Company and efforts to tax the production of cottonseed oil, an extremely valuable crop for black tenant farmers.

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