The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-01-23
MEN, WOMEN
 AND THINGS

wiler This time it was to be present
 at a smoker given by the Birmingham
 Furniture Dealers association to dis
 cuss the oommissary situation.
 |
 I was glad to find that the furniture
 dealers had invited representative men from other civic bodies to meet with them This was good sign Too ire Iquently meetings are too narrow in scope ito get a proper community perspective. |
 President R. L. Sparkman was hindered by hoarseness from presiding and called
 on c. W. Green to act in his place. MT.
 Green took the chair, apologizing that
 he was no speaker or presiding officer,
 but just plain business man. There was
 no need of this statement for he kept
 the meeting going like an old hand at the
 business and his introductory talk was
 one of the best of the evening
 l I have no regrets for having coun-
 seled that it would be the part of wisdom
 to first get high type men from the va
 rious civic bodies to study carefully the I
 who had analysed and adjusted the facts
 to bring them before the heads of the various corporations and see if plan
 could not be worked out whereby the
 interest of both as we'll as that of the community might be conserved.
 | Without reflecting on the speeches of
 anyone I believe Louis Pizitz struck the
 keynote in saying that there had been
 too much selfishness and too much fight ling among the merchants themselves, and
 that before they began to talk about
 fighting the corporations they had better
 get together and show one another a
 spirit of helpfulness and cooperation. 1 I know that the Golden Rule Is dis counted by some in the business world, l and that of David Harum substituted, DO unto others as they would do unto you, and do 1t first" There has been too
 much of this spirit here in Birmingham.
 I'm not going to preach, but when busi-
 ness man like Pizitz pleads for co-opera-
 tion based on altruism, I'm going to say amen.
 | Let no one get 1t into his head that this means I'll not ring clear note if believe any interest, big or little. Is playing unfair to one another or trying to gouge the community. I stand for the square deal and therefore I plead for team work. Arlie Barber dived below the commits sary situation and made strong plea for a comprehensive revaluation of our
 commercial, social and industrial life While all did not agree with him in some of his positions, yet they credited him with being sincere in his desire to better the living and business conditions in the district.
 One of the striking incidents of the
 meeting was the sudden conversion of T. H. Molton one of the leading spirits in the Real Estate exchange He opened with a speech stating that there were two sides to the comrnissary question, but before the session closed he jumped to his feet and said that he had been con- Iverted and was ready to fight the com missaries. It reminded one of an old-time revival scene.
 J. B. Shropshire made a sensible and telling talk. He had had large exper- fence in a commissary and as mer- chant He gave both sides of the ques- ton without coloring. He struck me as a man who was trying to be fair. One of the cleverest and most forceful and practical talks was made by Dr. J. H. Finder. He did not want the move ment to go off half-cocked. He had had experience in interviewing heads of cor porations. He had found them prepared when he and his committee were not, and so he pleaded for thorough study and Henry Porter, Jr., showed by his speech that while he felt that the commissaries were an evil. he thought that there were certain practices among the mer- chants themselves that needed reforming before they could be in a position to wipe out the sore spots of the commissary system. The speech of MT. Aland of the Ideal Millinery company went more into detail and showed just how the commissaries affected the retail merchant. c. M. Lane,
 president of the Retail Butchers asso-
 citation, gave instances of what he thought was unfair competition. Bert l Throckmorton, president of the Real Es-
 tate exchange gave evidence then in his talk that he wanted to do the right thing, but had an open mind on the question. While practically every man present at | the meeting expressed himself as in fa- vor of the abolition of the commissary l system it was the sense of the meeting l that 1t would be better to launch the l campaign as peace project and in the event such methods failed to fight the 1 interests behind the commissary system. l With the above end in view, President
 R. |. Sparkman of the Furniture Dealers association named to be a part of the central committee representing the civic organizations of the city: Dr. J. H. Tin
 der and George McCleery from the Board l of Trade; J. B. Shropshire and Frank l Wood from the Retail Grocers and