These proceedings from a bicentennial forum at the University of Tennessee examine the role agrarian tradition has played in shaping U.S. heritage, basic values, and sociopolitical forces; implications of changing values for public policy are also scrutinized. The forum involved humanists and social scientists as speakers and a diverse audience of key state and local decision makers from the public and private sectors (including rural leaders), teachers, newspaper editors, and scholars. An introductory paper pinpoints change from a society of rural landholders to one with primarily an urban-industrial base and lists specific forum concerns about whether values derived from agrarian tradition are applicable to public policy formation in an urban age. Eight papers discuss:"Agrarian Tradition: Historical Perspective and Emerging Challenge"; "Interaction of Rural and Urban Values as Viewed by the Journalist"; "Jeffersonian Thought in an Urban Society"; "Agrarian Tradition and American Agriculture in International Perspective"; "Changing Rural Values--Focus on Local Government"; "Agrarian Tradition and the Political Economy of Resource Use"; "American Public Schools and the Agrarian Myth"; "Agrarianism and Farm Organizations in the United States". The appendix includes major characteristics of successful farm organizations and a brief history of farm movements. (RS)