202 Organization of the American Biological Society [Jan. 



diminish the cost, to the members of the society, of dues to societies 

 and siibscriptions for these Journals. 



Details of Organization. Membership. All members of the 

 present biological societies should be eligible for membership with- 

 out further action and should become members on payment of the 

 dues. Such societies are those of Anatomy, Physiology, Zoology, 

 Botany, Experimental Medicine, Pharmacology when organized, 

 Psychology, Biochemistry, Bacteriology, and so on. All persons 

 sufficiently interested in the progress of biology to pay the dues 

 of the society should be eligible for membership. 



LocAL SECTiONS. The Constitution should provide for the for- 

 mation of local sections in different cities, a certain per cent. of the 

 dues of the members of such a local section to be repaid to the 

 section for local expenses. 



Affiliation of present societies. The present societies 

 should ultimately organize as sections of the Biological Society, 

 thus saving extra dues. Membership in these sections might be 

 determined by the sections themselves. 



Dues. Dues should be sufficient to provide that each member 

 should receive the Biological Abstract Journal, and some or all of 

 the other biological Journals. How this may be arranged is shown 

 beyond (page 265 ) . The cost of the Journals should be much lower 

 to the members of the society than to Outsiders. 



Explanation of the proposed plan. The plan presented in 

 the foregoing Statements is virtually that adopted with such great 

 success by the chemists of the country. A few years ago the chem- 

 ists were in the position of the biologists today. There were sev- 

 eral small societies; there was nominally a general Organization 

 dragging out an unprofitable existence. There were several Jour- 

 nals badly supported. The American Chemical Society was orga- 

 nized and ultimately the smaller societies became convinced of the 

 advantage of Cooperation. Now, most of them have become sec- 

 tions of the general society. The growth of this society has been 

 very rapid ; and it has grown in vigor as well as in size. Two years 

 ago^ the society started a chemical abstract Journal and it is not too 

 much to say that this has done more for the chemical interests 



*The reader is reminded that this was written in 1908. [Ed.] 



