Co-Operative Organization. 113 



EVERY MEMBER A PARTNER. 



The manager should miss no opportunity to make every member feel 

 that he is a Joint owner in the association and its property, jointly 

 interested in its success; that each member is, or should be, in spirit a 

 partner (although not legally so), and interested in keeping down 

 expense, and seeing that the association pursues a safe and conservative 

 course. Members should be made to realize that the association is not 

 a commission house, seeking to make as much as possible for itself, but 

 that it is a thing of their own creation, acting solely for their interests; 

 that it is themselves acting through delegated authority. 



SAFE BUSINESS METHODS NECESSARY. 



While the association is for the benefit of the farmers, that benefit 

 should be held secondary to the sound fmancial condition and the per- 

 petuity of the association. It should avoid speculation, and do nothing 

 to impair its credit and business efficiency. Fruit-growers should know 

 that they have a more than one season's interest in the success of the 

 association. If it is compelled to suspend, the marketing of their products 

 reverts to haphazard methods. 



HOW TO EFFECT A LEGAL ORGANIZATION. 



Your Organization shou'.d be incorporated. Otherwise the membors 

 will be only partners. A partnership of so many persons would bc a 

 cumbersome and embarrassing proposition. It would also cause an 

 individual liability that would be undesirable. If you incorporate, 

 members' individual liability will be limited to their unpaid subsciip- 

 tions for stock. The assets of a corporation are alone lvable for corporate 

 obligations. The steps necessary to incorporate and get the Organization 

 on to a legal footing, prepared to do business, are simple, but they 

 should be followed in proper Order and with care. A brief outline of 

 them may be useful to communities wishing to incorporate an association, 

 and not wishing to incur the expense of legal assistance. 



A meeting of fruit-growers should be called. If it is then decided 

 to organize an association, a motion should be made that A, B and C 

 (naming them) be authorized to prepare and file articles of incorpoi'a- 

 tion of the proposed association. The three persons thus chosen should 

 make and subscribe written articles of incorporation, in triplicate, and 

 should acknowledge them before a notary. They must file one of these 

 documents in the office of the clerk of their county, mail another to the 

 Secretary of State at Salem, to be filed by him, and keep the third copy, 

 to be turned over to the secretary of their association when their Organ- 

 ization is completed. These articles of incorporation must specify flve 

 things: 1 — the name of the association, and the proposed duration of 

 its existence; 2 — the business in which the association proposes to 

 engage; 3 — the place where the principal office will be (that is, the town 

 or city) ; 4 — the amount of capital stock; 5 — the amount of each share 

 thereof. In complying with the second requisite, it is best to embrace 

 as many activities as the association will likely wish to pursue, in order 

 that they may not be hampered by lack of legal authority, when their 

 business becomes more complex. I have incorporated herewith the 

 articles of incorporation of our association as a model of the proper 

 form. The second specification required by law to be made is sufficiently 

 comprehensive in our articles to cover any enterprise in which a fruit- 

 growers' Organization should engage. 



