Fitzgerald leader enterprise and press. (Fitzgerald, Ben Hill County, Ga.) 1921-1964, 1921-08-05
COTTON MARKETING
COMMITTEE NAMED
A. ]. Sword Will Head Farmers
Body; James Secretary
GORMAN MAKES SPEECH
Union Official Urges Farmers to
Organize AS Only Salvation
from Wall Street

Operative Cotton Marketing Associa.
ton was made at a mass meeting al
the Court House Wednesday after.
noon at which w. T. Hanson OF
Cobb County and 0. D. German Of
Mauk, Ga, spoke. A. J. Swords is
temporary chairman, H. H, James
secretary, L. F. Ashurst, T. M. Viii
banks, w. J. Wilson organizing COM
mittee. Mayor ]. L. Pittman pre-
sided at the meeting and introduced
the speakers. About three hundred
farmers from Ben Hill and Erwin
counties heard the addresses. No
contracts were signed at the first
meeting and actual organization will
not be perfected until later meeting.
Y. d. German, who is general
Chairman of the railroad telegrapher's
who are on strike against the A. B. &
A., assrted that the farmers only
salvation from his we'll known pres
ent condition was organization. He
pointed out that every other interest
IN the world was we'll organized and
that as resalt the farmer was con-
tinually being ground between the
upper and neither millstones, organ
lied labor and organized capital
Farmers Can Stick Together
Mr.. German charged that the in
terests who exploited the farmer had
tor years been spreading propaganda
against farmers organization. "The
old whine that the farmers cant stick
together, can't organize, is nothing
more nor less than an insidious prop
uganda that has been spread so thick
that even the farmers are saying it
and believing it, Mr.. German said,
but 1t is not true and the farmer who
> says the farmer can't organize ought
to be hit in the head with stick and
put out of his misery"
Mr.. Hanson went straight into the
practical details of the organization
of the Georgia Cotton Growers Co.
operative Association, describing its
main features and its objectives. The
distinctive feature of the 'Sapiro plan
is the compulsory contract which the
farmer can break only by dying. quit
growing cotton 'or moving out of the
state.
Mr.. Hanson plead with his hearers
to do their own thinking on the ques-
ton OF cooperative marketing and
IN justice to themselves and their
families to study the question thor
oughly before they either refused it
or accepted it in order that they might
make their decision intelligent1y No
contracts were signed at the meeting
Irwin Comes Interested
Seven farmers from Irwin county.
including w. A. "Uncle Bill' Tank
ersley former representative, H. B.
Harper of Wray, farmers Union head
In Irwin, were at the meeting and re-
quested Mr.. Hanson to come to Irwin
county to organize a unit as soon as
he possibly can. The Irwin farmers
are intensely interested in the plan,
they said.
The fractional fight between the
State Department of Agriculture
which has espoused the Sapro plan.
and the State College of Agriculture
which has tentatively endorsed an op-
tional contract plan worked out by
the Federal bureau of markets, is
impeding the progress of the move
ment toward an effective marketing
association in this and other counties
OF the State. A certain prejudice ex-
listing in some quarters against the
State bureau of markets is obstruct-
ing the Sapiro plans advancement
and similar prejudice in other quar-
tiers against the state, college and the
extension department is seemingly
pretty sure to wreck any movement
toward swinging optional contract
plan. At meeting some time ago
at which Farm Bureau leader spoke
the optional contract plan was en-
'dorsed but no steps we've taken toward
organizing cooperative marketing
association unGer that plan
Organization Is Necessary
1t is generally agreed among the
farmers and merchants in towns whe, q
agriculture is the chief industry that
some plan of cooperative marketing
is necessary but many close obsers-
ers of sentiment in this section are du-
bious over the success of any plan ua-
less the State Bureau of Markets and
the State College Extension depart
ment become agreed on it. With
the oil and fertilizer inspectors and
other men scattered throughout the
state who are partisan to the State
Bureau of Markets working with the
county agents and other partisans of
the State College, the success of any
one sound plan would be insured
A. ]. Swords and H. H. James the
temporary officers of the local asso