The patron of husbandry. (Columbus, Miss.) 1875-1883, 1879-12-27
COOPERATION.
BY PAST MASTER MAXWELL, OF THE

BY PAST MASTER MAXWELL, OF THE
TENNESSEE STATE GRANGE.
Theory without practice is Improbable.
To secure the benefits of cooperation, we
must practice it, To admit the theory is
correct and not practice it, is like waiting
to get on the train after it is under head
way. Crying too late! is no relief. To
say, if others will, I will, and yet not act,
ends in the cry, too late!
To excuse yourself because bargain is
offered you by merchant in one bill of
goods, or on one bale of cotton that you
can as well send to a cooperative COM
mission house in one of the great business
centres from which you would receive div
idends, is like the rail road ticket-"good
for this trip only That offer is made to
prevent you and all the people from doing
what the business world is doing, that is
from managing your own business. Under
the merchants business system, they get
the dividends, and you and and the rest
of the customers pay the costs and all ex-
penses as well as the dividends, and get
no share of the dividends: we simply get
the accommodations we needed at our 0zon
expense.
Co operation has been taught by prac-
tice in England until it is nqelonger a
question there as to its benefits to custom
ers. 1t has been taught in the United
States by lectures, written and printed es-
says, ETC., and by actual practice in many
| localities, until is being well understood
here theoretically.
A few years ago, E. Neal and his three
co-laborers, accredited representatives. of
cooperation in England, made the tour of
the United States, and at the solicitation
of the representatives of the Grange, they
promulgated by public lectures the theory
of cooperation and presented its practical
benefits.
The National Grange was so thoroughly
| convinced and converted to the great pos
sibilities of the cooperative system for
good, that it recommended to the people
its acceptance State Oranges also rec
commended it, and individuals advocated
it, and in many places are practicing it to
their good Some of the leading Grange
papers advocate it, and give results from
its practice as encouragement for its uni
versal adoption.
The distinguished Mr.. Holyoke of Eng
land was recently in this country, educa-
ting the people in co operation in his clear
and forcible way by facts and figures and
with telling effect: the workingmen OF
Boston and other cities are becoming thor
oughly aroused on the subject and are rap
idly putting it into practice.
More recently, the modest Mr. T. 7
Carver, General Manager of the South
western Cooperative Association at e
Carondelet street, New Orleans, is dis
seminating more convincing information
70, 1;~rh% 6 h i
results of cooperation in a few lines fol
lowing the New Orleans market quota
tons, which he publishes every week in
THE PATRON, than can be found in many
pages on the subject
His statements are based upon more
than three years of actual practice in his
the business of the Association. They are
brought directly to the attention of the
farmers through the columns of THE PA
IRON, Grange journal which, as an adj
vocate of the farmers best interests, has
no superior. If all farmers were readers
of that paper. the farmers cause would
languish no where.
But no matter who are the advocates OF
cooperation, nor how many, nor how
great the good offered, the theory without
practice is Improbable.
More than three years of observation
and devotion to the work have convinced
the writer that greater possibilities for
good were never offered the American
producers than is to be derived from prac-
teal cooperation in buying and selling.
To get the immediate benefits of CO.
operation, let all who have any article of
produce, and especially cotton, send it at
once to Mr.. Carver. You will thus secure
the benefit resulting from your business;
but if you deal with merchants, they will
reap the benefits.
Humboldt. Dec. 20.