The Daily Ardmoreite. [volume] (Ardmore, Okla.) 1893-current, 1911-02-14

| the Convention of Southern Merchants
| which meets in Nashville, Feb. 2S, for
four days consideration OF the par
ce.s post and other subjects OF vital
interest to merchants. Among those
who are practically certain to come
are. Hon. John Sharp Williams OF
Mississippi. United States senator
elect; T. j. Fernley, of Richmond,
| Va. secretary-treasurer Of the Nation
nj Association of Hardwood Jobbers;
/ GOV. b. ". Hooper of Tennessee;
| Thos. II. Potts, secretary OF the Ma
| tional Association of Retail Druggists.
On the tentative list are Gov Judson
Harmon. Of Ohio, Gov. Woodrow will
son of New Jersey, Gen Luke e.
| Wright of Memphis, secretary OF war
in Roosevelt's cabinet, formerly gov
ernor general of the Philippines and
ambassador to Japan, and a number OF
others who have attained to national
prominence i'm craftsmanship, diplo'
macy and business endeayor.
Concentrated effort Is to be made to
render impossible the passage OF a
parcels post BILL not only at the pres
ent term of congress but at any sub
sequent term, by demonstrating the
evils It would entail on retail mer-
chants. not only, but as well on all
interests that in any way touch mer-
camille enterprise. II is the belief OF
those who have brought about the
holding of convention that n par
cells post law, such as that now pend
ing before congress, would drain the
rural communities of their capital
and population, aggrayate the evils
of centralized wealth and congested
cities and that only two classes of in
terests the retail catalogue mail or.
der houses and the express compa'
MES, would receive any sort of benefit.
The theory, of which much capital
has been made by certain interests,
that the passage of the b.ll now be-
fore congress would result detrimen-
tally to the express companies and
that those companies are preventing
its passage has been exploded. The
scheme for a rural parcels post such
| as the bill calls for, according to the
contention of the merchants. will not
/ create competition with the express
companies, but will give them mon
opoly Of carrying packages from the
mail order house to the local postof-
fee, and the packages will be taken
in charge by the mail carriers only
after they have reached point where
the express companies can carry them
no further.
The situation that would be created,
as summarized by member of the
executive committee of the conven
ton of southern merchants in an in
terview, follows:
In every country town, catalogue
agents of mail order concerns would
establish themselves. They would
need no store, pay no rent, employ nc
clerks, require no credit and give
none. and carry no stock Their time
would he devoted to soliciting orders
from catalogues, The merchandise
would be shipped to them by express
or freight from the retail mail ordel
houses in the large cities. When re
ceived it would be deposited in the 10
cal postoffiCe and the packages deliv
cred by the rural carriers.
THE rural free delivery system, in
augurated for the educational ad
vancement of the people, would thu:
he subverted from its original purpose
and would become mere instrument
or agency in the hands of the great
retail mail order catalogue house fol
the development of the most oppres
sive trust that human ingenuity coult
devise-The Mail Order Trust
trust that would eventually contro
ali sources of supply and all channels
Of distribution for everything the peo
pie must eat, wear and use in thei'
daily lives.
"No one but the retail mail orde'
catalogue houses, dealing in all class
es of merchandise, could maintain
local catalogue agent and solicitor IL
town. They would thus be giver
monopoly of the commercial advan
tages of this new system of merchan
disc delivery by the mail carriers OF
the rural routes. The country mer
chants would be destroyed by this
competition. They could not meet I