The Omaha guide., 1946-12-28
Co-ops And Racial
Understanding
Edited by VERNA p. HARRIS
By Richard Giles
Managing Editor, Cooperative
NeUs Service. N. Y.

News Service, ". Y.
A coop is a group of people
banded together to accomplish
some economic purpose. Usually
the purpose is to get better
quality goods at lower prices. .
groceries, gasoline, electrical ap-
pliances, or whatever the group Is
interested in Membership open to
all, capital supplied by savings OF
the members, refunds paid in pro
portion to purchases. these are
the rinciples of organization. In
the United States there are close
to a million consumers organized
in this way. The great majority
are farmers because farmers have
been exploited by monopolies a
lot more than city people openly.
But city people r organizing
co-ops too. New coop grocery
stores, housing projects, medical
plans, gas stations and milk
routes are being announced from
day to day. Since June the Michi-
oil wv NOQllOll has I'LL llCd OOll-
siderable effort toward organizing
co-ops and already supermarkets
are planned in Detroit, Flint. Pom
tiac, and Lansing. ten of them in
Detroit.
Co-ops have added little to &C.
onomic theory. In general, coop
orators ascept the doctrines of
Adam Smith and visualize co-ops
as a method of making laissez-
faire work. If coops adhere to a
policy Of fair prices to farmers,
fair wages to labor and fair Pri-
ces to consumers, they argue, pri-
vate enterprise will be forced to
follow suit. 1t is commonly said
that co-ops need operate only Is
per cent of the nations business
to put an end to monopoly prac-
tees. This has been shown to be
true at least in Ohio, where the
farmers co-ops manufacture Is
per cent of the fertilizer made in
the state and have paid excellent
wages to labor while cutting mo-
nopoly price in half.
It would be a mistaye to think
that a coop can be operated pri-
mariIy as a weapon against rae
ial discrimination. Any use of the
coop for a purpose other than
its economic goals may affect it's
efficiency and create factionalism
in it's membership. 1t would be
more realistic to say that a coop
operating on the principle of open
membership to all, offers an op-
portunity for people of all races
and religions to get together in
an economic activity, instead Of
forcing them into grudging COM
petition with each other. 1t would
be foolish to pretend that racial
understanding will automatically
result, especially since the mem
bers are exposed to SO many other
influences in their daily lives, but
it is certainly true that the plane
is tilted a bit in the proper dir
ection and the balls may roll down
it if they are free to roll.
In practice there have been
co-ops formed by people of all
kinds of convictions. Some co-ops
have been formed in Negro CON-
unities, some in typical Southern
white communities. There is such
a thing as Jim Crowism in coop
eratives, just as there is in the
schools, restaurants, railroad sta
tons and movie theatres. The ex-
istence of Jim Crowism, however
is no OF an indictment of o
,orb a than of education or
transportation or eating. Ultimate
ly. cooperation like education
leads to the destruction Of pre-
You can say this with more
assurance since in some northern
communities there have been Ne
groes who started co-ops which
eventually took in white members
and there are co-ops started by
which have taken in Ne
gro members. This would proba-
bly, not happen in a city where
racial prejudice is strong, but it
has happened in cities where ra-
cial prejudice exists. since after
al it exists everywhere.
/ get the impression that a
fair number of southern white
boys learned during their years
IN military service that they
could get along with Negroes
better than they knew. Perhaps
it is reasonable to compare the
lesson to be learned through
membership in a coop. the les
son is learned almost by accident
but there is good chances that it
will stick.
-APA-