Vermont farmer. [volume] (Newport, Orleans County, Vt.) 1870-1877, 1874-11-06
A REFUGE OF LIES.

We call attention to the letter from Mr..
Boyden in another place. 1t is naturally
TO be expected that the traders should view
with alarm the rapidity with which the or
der of Patrons is spreading through the
land. But it is most narrow-minded and
suicidal policy that leads them to resort to
Islander aud falsehood as available weapons
against the new movement. There is some
thing in very old book about the refuge of
lies being swept away, the violent dealing o.
the wicked returning upoa his own pate,
&c, which these gentlemen will do well to
consider.
We know something of the status Of the
grange movement in this state as well as out
of it, and we heartily endorse the position
taken by Mr.. Boyden, knowing the case to
be as he says. The order has steadily in
creased in numbers and prosperity since its
inception, and the principles upon which it
is based are so manifestly just that it cannot
do otherwise than meet with success.
The Patrons have no war with merchants !;
there is no antagonism except as the latter
stir it up. But the Patrons claim the right
to purchase what they want where they can
get it the cheapest for the quality. If the
merchant can get goods for them as cheap as
they can get them otherwise, he will get
,bo;, .ro1o g., elf mi orast mill lood tbap, IN
avoid the care and trouble of the business
But if the merchant cannot sell them as
cheap as they can buy elsewhere, they are
under no obligations to buy of him, simply
that he may get living. If the farmer has
potatoes, butter, or other produce to sell the
production of which has cost him more than
the regular market price, you will not find
the merchant paying him 40 cents per pound
TOR his butter when he can get as good butter
for 80. The merchant buys where no car
buy on the most advantageous terms, and he
has no right to complain because the farmer
docs the same.
If the merchants feel that the organization
of system of cooperative trading is thing
to be dreaded and avoided, the best thinl
they can do is to put down their prices to 81
low a figure that cooperation will not be abl'
to get below them. Thus they will remove
the desirability Of cooperation, and nip tn
thing in the bud. But they are not awar
~ Nha nf fbn NJ
They don't think there will be much of
shower, and they hesitate. While they do SO
the Sovereigns and the Patrons are periectinl
their arrangements SO that it will soon be to
late to stop them, and the policy Of slande
and false abuse which some have adopte
against these societies will tell in their ia
vor, instead of harming them. We see moth
ing ahead but system Of combination i
purchases, buying direct from the consumer
which will do away with jobbcrs retailer
agents, and the most useless aud oppressiy
class, because so expensive,-the drummer
Trade is about to experience gigantic re'
Olution, and in all the large commercial Gel
tiers instead Of goods passing from the pr
ducer to the commission man, and from hi
to the jobber, and from him through ii
agency of drummers to the retailer, each +
ceiving a handsome per cent for handlir
them, we shall have a general system
warehousinggoods, thus passing them thrOug
but one mans hands between producer al
consumer, and employing him at a salal
and subjecting his work to so close supe
vision as make speculation impossible. TIL
may not come speedily, but come it will, al
the course Of those who assail the Patro
aud the Sovereigns with Islander and falls
hood will not have a tendency to put
further in the future.