26 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



June 23, 1922 



perpetuated one of the strongest organizations of its kind and that is the 

 Southern Hardwood Traffic Association. Why haven't you organized the 

 National Hardwood Manufacturers' Association? Is it not because the 

 other fellow beat you to it? Is it not because that other organization has 

 become so powerful that you are afraid to buck it? 



Things to Consider 



Now here are the things that you are here to consider ; 1. Whether 

 you can organize a National association that will select and distribute cer- 

 tain statistics that are valuable to the industry? It has been said that 

 you have hanging over you the decision of the Supreme Court of the 

 United States. That is true. I have carefully read that decision and 

 tried to read it in the light of other decisions of that court. Whatever 

 else may be said about that decision it cannot be said that it holds, or that 

 the Supreme Court of the United States has ever held, that one must do 

 business in the dark or that knowledge is a crime. There is no doubt but 

 ■what under the law you have the right and the duty to inform yourselves 

 as to the conditions under which you do business. 1 don't believe that 

 any court in the land will ever say "nay" to that proposition, provided it is 

 free from an.v collusion and is simply a detailed statement of the conditions 

 as they exist or as they may have existed in the past. The most impor- 

 tant thing is as to whether you will form a National organization and put 

 Into effect the so-called Hoover plan. There is only one reason why you 

 should not do that, and that is that you are all afraiil you may be expelled 

 from the National association, as two gentlemen here have been. Some of 

 these gentlemen who signed the call for this meeting have received from 

 the National Hardwood Lumber Association telegrams, and here is one 

 of them signed by the president of the National Hardwood .Association : 

 "Please advise me if you authorize the use of your name in connection 

 with the call for a meeting to be held in Louisville at an early date for the 

 purpose of organizing another hardwood lumber association, and if it is 

 your intention to encourage and support a renewal of factional strife in 

 the hardwood industry?" 



As I see it, that is a challenge : in other words, it is a threat, "Don't 

 you dare go to Louisville and go to that meeting." As a result of that 

 telegram every man who received it has to show whether he is a man, or a 

 mouse, or a long-tailed rat. 



Can't the Hardwood Producer Organize? 



What are the reasons why ynu need a National Manufacturers' Associa- 

 tion? You heard yesterday from the secretary of the National Lumber 

 Manufacturers' Association. That is an organization like all other national 

 associations except the Hardwood association. No man can belong to it 

 that does not produce lumber. The same thing is true of the Southern 

 Pine Association. Why are you guilty of lese majeste if you undertake 

 to organize along the same lines that everybody else is organized? These 

 are business problems. That is a powerful organization, and it may be said 

 If they incur its displeasure and are expelled you cannot sell lumber 

 because so many of your customers demand National inspection. You 

 will have to have something to substitute for that. I have always been 

 one of those half wits that never caretl much for money, but I believe 

 had I received a telegram like that I would have gone out and tried to 

 find me some consumers of lumber who were willing to buy what I had. 

 who would not demand National inspection, and if I could not do busi- 

 ness that way I would go int«.i the coal business or some other business. 



There has been a good deal of talk about turning the other cheek and 

 brotherly love, all of which is very fine and Christ like, but hardly human. 

 For my part I admit that I am a mere human and have no Christ-like qual- 

 ity, and under these circumstances my disposition wo\ild be to take a club 

 rather than to turn the other cheek. 



There has also been some talk about running this organization as a sort 

 of eleemosynary institution. This organization, like any other trade organ- 

 ization, in my opinion ought to be one for trade and business purposes. It 

 is true that you best serve yourselves when you serve the public institu- 

 tion. 



Contrasting Hardwood Rules 



Now one thing that impres^^es me about these national rules. 1 was read- 

 ing them the other day and I noticed that "Only members of the National 

 Hardwood Lumber Association can obtain an original national inspection 

 and any member who applies for inspection on lumber which he has neither 

 bought nor sold is subject to suspension or expulsion from the association." 



The rule of the Hardwood Manufacturers' Association provides : 



"The service of the Inspection Department will be extended to consumers 

 on transactions with non-members of this association, provided the pur- 

 chase was made on the basis of the rules of this association." 



In other words, every manufacturer ought to want the inspection open 

 to all the world because all the world ought to be his possible customer. 



Now, two old members of the National association have been expelled 

 from that organization because they did not vote at the Hoover meeting 

 as they were expected by that organization to vote. I say that action was 

 an unwarranted outrage and so far as 1 am personally concerned I resent 

 it bitterly and personally I think every other member of that organization 

 ought to do the same thing. 



And all the rest of you have the sword of Democles hanging over your 

 heads and you have to act in the light of that fact. That means if you are 

 to act at all you must have a very considerable part of the industry lined up 

 with you. When the Hoover meeting was on, the representatives of the 

 manufacturers voted for standardization of rules and brands on grades, so 

 that lumber could not be bought for common and sold as firsts or seconds. 



The members of the National Hardwood Lumber Association voted against 

 that proposition because a good many of its members would have to change 

 their methods of doing business if that rule were adopted. Understand me, 

 I don't think you ought to form an organization to fight anybody else, but I 

 do think you ought to form a militant organization strong enough to protect 

 the interests of the manufacturers of lumber and that would give the manu- 

 facturers of lumber some say-so about the rules under which their product 

 shall be sold. I think you have a right to fight for this plan and I think 

 the time has come when it is your duty to fight for this plan and I further 

 believe that that fight can be successfully made. 



Absolutism Is Outworn 



Absolutism has never prevailed for long. It tailed in Rome. It failed in 

 Russia. It was not a success in Germany, although more highly and effi- 

 ciently organized there than ever before in the history of the world. In this 

 country our Fathers proclaimed in the Constitution that absolute authority 

 is vested nowhere. Yet absolute authority has been vested somewhere in the 

 hardwood industry, as you all know. You have a right to fight absolutism. 

 You have a duty to protect your industry. You have a duty to so plan an 

 organization that your industry may be conducted along legitimate lines 

 and that the public may know when they buy a given thing that they get 

 what they buy. If the manufacturer does not protect his own. he cannot ex- 

 pect anybody else to do it for him. 



I have read in the histor.v of ancient Greece where -Alexander the Great, 

 after having conquered the world and having become the absolute monarch 

 or the world, heard of the cynic philosopher Diogenes. He sought him out 

 and found Diogenes poor and shabby and ragged and barefooted. And 

 the great conqueror said to Diogenes : "If you will come to my palace and 

 entertain me I will clothe you in royal raiment." Diogenes looked up and 

 said : "Get out of my light ; let the sunshine fall on me." I think the time 

 has come for the hardwood manufacturers to say to their King Alexander 

 (though this is not his name) : "Get out of my light; let the sunshine 

 fall on me." 



Committees Appointed 



President Sherrill named the following committees: 



Nominations — W. E. Satterfield, chairman; F. K. Conn, S. M. 

 Kickey, W. E. Delaney, M. W. Stark, J. B. Edwards, F. L. Adams, 

 E. B. Norman. 



Eesolutions — H. B. Anderson, W. A. Ransom, L. C. Bell and M. W, 

 Stark. 



On motion of B. F. Dulweber a committee will be named, which 

 will work on a plan for districting the country, so that each dis- 

 trict may be represented on the directorate, findings of the commit- 

 tee to be reported at the next meeting. 



In closing the morning session President Sherrill stated that the 

 new organization started off with a clean slate, as the old American 

 Hardwood Manufacturers' Association had funds in hand to meet 

 every and all obligations, and had not sent out any bills for dues 

 since March. This closed the session. 



Mr. Durgin Talks to the Point 

 W. A. Durgin, assistant secretary of commerce, made a very 

 strong and interesting talk, which carried a forecast of Federal 

 control, if the various hardwood interests could not get together 

 and drop their jealousies, selfishly-disposed arguments and come 

 into the plan as a unit. In fact, he showed very plainly what was 

 likely to happen to those opposing the plan. Mr. Durgin 's address 

 was as follows: 



Gentlemen: These are pregnant days for lumbermen! The recent dis' 

 cussions of your various groups with the National Luml>er Manufacturers* 

 Association at the Department of Commerce may be regarded as the first 

 step in a movement which, we hope, will co-ordinate all parts of the great 

 lumber industry in the development of essential unity in standai'ds of 

 service, of product and of business ethics. While these discussions were 

 essentially preliminary in character, the interest shown by producers, 

 distributors and users, and the almost unanimous determination to go for- 

 ward in straightening out the tangle of grades, names, sizes and inspection 

 rules which now exist, give most encouraging promise of the prompt 

 formulation and adoption of genuine correctives. 



Any one of these specific measures toward simplification, or standardiza- 

 tion, may well prove of great import, but the underlying basis — the devel- 

 opment of wise self-government under the inspiration of the industries' 

 own leaders — is of far greater importance. The real question, we think, 

 is whether the lumber group can thus make effective the wisdom and 

 vision which some of its leaders possess in determining a far-sighted' 

 policy of high public service and of fundamentally sound practice, or 

 whether the lumber industry and other great industries will permit the 

 blindness of immediate self-interest and of clique jealousies to so dominate, 

 that the great consuming public must, in self-defense, insist upon Federal 

 regulation as the only possible corrective tio, th^ inevitable iniquities of 

 an utterly selfish program. 



