Prior to the 1930s, there was little federal role in providing disaster assistance to farmers and ranchers. In 1886, Congress appropriated $10,000 for the Department of Agriculture to purchase seed for drought-stricken farmers in Texas, but President Grover Cleveland vetoed the act with the message, “Federal aid in such cases encourages the expectation of paternal care on the part of government and weakens the sturdiness of our national character” (Porter, 1988). With the New Deal legislation in the 1930s, this sentiment changed considerably as Congress and the Roosevelt Administration came to the aid of Dust Bowl farmers. Since the 1930s, federal disaster assistance to farmers has been provided through three programs: (a) crop insurance, (b) emergency loans,.
