The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1914-04-15

scious does not in the least change
control.
Conditions in Texas have caused a
rural revolution; and that renters pc
titiOn to Governor Colquitt was but a
sporadic fire Of the deeper discomfort.
For one I believe hat between the
absentee landlord, wherever he may
be, and the absentee stakeholder Of
the Lawrence cotton mills there is no
great difference: and between the over
worked, underpaid foreign population
who manned the Lawrence mills and
the poverty-stricken anaemic tenants
Of the south there is a parallel.
1t is here we may sense the great
humanitarian mission Of the farmers
marketing movement-to make it pos
sible for the tenant population to pro-
duce q fair product and receive for it
a fair price.
What, you will say, should be the
incentive for farmers? 1t is the non
profit making corporation, q form of
corporation that gives the growers the
three fundamentals of power-Q) the
power to manufacture, CD to sell, and
|(3) to buy n product connected
with or necessary in the carving on
Of a legitimate business enterprise.
L n olIly WV SldLCS W lily huO" lSuSS
that have these laws are the states ]
have mentioned.
The first thing that we must do in
a national campaign such as is con-
templated by this organization today
is to make it possible for wv in
every state to organize with the power
Of protecting their own interests by
such action as l have here described
The non-proit making corporation
should in no sense be interpreted as
a monopoly or an organization in re-
straint of trade.
The cooperative corporation offers
no incentive to the speculator; pro
Vides automatically for the buying OF
stock n the taking up Of stock; is
non-eXclusive in that it will take in
any member; cannot restrain trade
because in a perishable fruit industry
the stuff must sell, and sell fast; al
lows farmers the most satisfactory
way of t~ransacting their affairs by
either the one man, one vote. or the
acreage vote basis; finances it's opera
tons by levying upon the packages as
they move adds a new element OF
credit to the community by giving
the cooperative corporation the pow
er to borrow money upon the joint
| security Of all the land represented in
the organization; adds to the com
munity wealth because of the greater
profits that come through such an or
ganization; does not try to fix the
prices of products, but seeks an even
distribution to avoid Cutting any
marketing and to prevent an over
stocking of all markets; and even has
the somewhat doubtful benefit oil
raising land values.
In these way the cooperative cor
poration creates and makes perman-
ent machinery for marketing the pro
ducts of a community. 1t is truly &
community servant and constitutes q
permanent community property ire
spective of who owns the land repre-
sented in the corporations; and in a
typical agricultural community it will
have the same relation to the people
in economic service that the school
plant has for educational and social
service.
But whatever form of organization
the growers of one district may take
they must begin by developing fol
themselves credit. Their organization
must stand for something il the com
mercial world. 1t must have a rating
Its credit must be good or it cannot
succeed. The products which it sells
must have a name for quality.
The trade-marked, advertised farm
future.
The question of Standardization
goes to the whole root of farmers