PKOCEEDINGS OF THI". SIIMMHR .\l lll'.TING 63 



this moniing, accept ai)plicati()ns for business, and ship only lo tliose 

 approved by ibe directors. Then stay by them, if they prove true, the 

 entire season, and you minimize your loss and increase your profits. 



Mr. Morrill: And watch the business as closely as you possibly can — 

 I niijiht add (hat. 



Mr. Lawton: It occurs to me that this does not meet the evil. The 

 preamble in these resolutions sets forth all the misfortunes under which 

 fruitgrowers are sulfering, very faithfully. We can agree with all that 

 is set forth in the i)reanible, but when you come to the resolutions for the 

 remedy it does not seem to me that it meets it. We can not delegate this 

 thing. There is a disposition on the part of human nature, whenever 

 one gets into trouble, to look around and find a remedy by shoving 

 responsibility u])on somebody else. This advocates appointing a com- 

 missioner, and what does he do? Why, he simply authorizes somebody 

 to do business, and if that man does not do business right, he will 

 remove him. Now, we know that our troubles in Chicago are not with 

 "snide'' commission men. I never deal with such commission men or 

 men of no responsibility whatever. There are men who make no 

 returns, and all that, and those men will get certificates to do business 

 and you can not reach them or find out who they are. The remedy must 

 be different from that. I do not think the appointing of a commissioner 

 to give somebody a certificate to do business, and then taking -it away 

 if he does not do business right, is going to remedy the evil. W^e must get 

 away from the commission man. Have as little to do with him as pos- 

 sible, and contrive in some sort of way to sell our fruit and not allow 

 them to eat us up. 



Mr. Cornelius: I just want to say this, as to why we did not make 

 this resolution large enough to cover all creation. We must commence 

 as we can. This inspector in Chicago is not a man who is to go there 

 and do everything. He is a man, as I understand it, to be appointed by 

 the government, but in case letters are written to him. or business 

 actions of parties in the commission business are complained of, he is 

 to be empowered by congress to go and command them to show up 

 their books and their sales. 



The President: I did not understand the resolution in just that way, 

 but that the government was to license them first. 



Mr. Cornelius: License them, and by the means of their holding a 

 license the government has power to control them in this manner. I 

 can not see anything about that which is wrong. I am glad to hear that 

 Mr. Barnett and his society are co-operating with us and working in 

 the same line of business, but there is this point about it. they do not 

 seem to touch the class that are ruining us, that are stealing our goods. 

 I use these terms because I know it. I have sent goods over there and 

 have traced them and have found that they sold for one third more 

 than returns were made for. 



The President: You could have locked that man up in the peni- 

 tentiary. 



Mr. Cornelius: I did not know it. I have just found it out to-day. 

 But that is just for Illinois. We have commission men in other states. 

 Have all the states that law? We want this to be a TTnitcd States 

 law that will protect us against the commission men — the dishonest ones. 

 We wish to work wiih the honest ones, with Mr.. Barnett's societv. 



