Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1917-06-15
NOT MERGER, BUT
COOPERATION
Continued from First Page.)
some degree. are the only objects for
which an all-citixens organization can
effectively labor.

which an all-citixens' organization can
effectively labor.
Cooperation Not Consolidation.
individuals work together in organi-
| zation harmonfously and efficiently
only when they have the same great
vital object in view and when they do
not differ radically as to the method Of
accomplishing 1t.
| All Of the Washington examinations
have as their great object the welfare
of Washington. but they campaign for
this end along different lines Of ap-
proach and by different methods Of at
! tack.
The Oldest. the Board Of Trade. has
always been broadly representative
or less accurately. working primarily
for necessary legislation by Congress
and especially for public improvements.
1t has always been a non-commercial
! Though not an anti-commerciaD body.
| In its membership Of 1854 today 1t has
more lawyers than merchants, more ply
sicians than manufacturers. far more non
commercial than commercial members. OF
| its twenty committees. totaling nearly
| 900 in membership. only one is devoted
to the city's industrial interests. 1t
is not trade body except in name, but
| it is entitled to its name by prescrip-
ton. even though not a trade body, and
should not surrender It, BY act Of in
1
has possessed and used this name as
! the title of distinctly a civic and not a
trade organization for twenty-seven years.
The commercial members Of the
| Board OF Trade found many years ago
that with only minority membership
in that organization they could not
move 1t as quickly and as effectively as
they thought necessary to protect and
develop; in matters both small and
great. the trade and manufacturing in
terests of the capital They found that
| the board. while useful in cooperation
| In many ways. was too unwieldy and
too Indifferent to develop vigorously
and quickly commercial and Industrial
Washington.
From this condition two other or
CARNATIONS developed, the Business
Mems Association and the Jobbers and
Shippers Association. and these two
| commercial organizations later merged
into the Chamber of Commerce, de-
| voted primarily to Washingtons COM
mercial development. The Chamber OF
! Commerce was afterward found not to
mercial members to act vigorously and
| promptly to protect and develop mer-
camille interests. and. to look after
their particular concerns, the Retail
Merchants Association came into being
| The sectional citizens associations
were organized neither on commerce ial
nor non-commercial lines, but on the
principle of township or sectional rep
resentation. Each looks after it's own
peculiar local sectional interests, and
| either in the federation or standing
| alone, co-operates with other organfza-
| tons in handling wisely and .unitedly
issues OF general concern.
Disintegrate, Merge, D1sintegrate
Again.
] The commercial, non-commercia1 and
| sectional organizations cannot in Wash
| ington's interest be disintegrated and
| merged again into a single body. Such
| a body will soon be found too COM
| mercial or not commercial enough toe
| sectional or not sectional enough, toe
radical in pursuit Of factories or not
| radical enough, too loosely democratic
! to be efficient. or too despotic under
an alien expert secretary to be demo-
| cratic and locally endurable.
| II this single body were organized
! in accordance with the new system
which the Chamber of Commerce is
| considering, experience suggests that
| within a month after the perfection OF
| its organization of bureaus as substi-
tutes for committees and with a man
| aging secretary Of great powers and
| high salary, there would be an outcry
| against bureaucratic alien dictatorship
! and another organization on other lines
| would evolve.
| Broad commercial plans were tried
| out in the Board of Trade about ter
years ago, when it was sought to make
| 1t the sole Washington citizens or
| ganfZation. A separate commercial Sec
rotary. costing from $4,000 to $1,000 an
! nually. was vigorously but unsuccess