HORTICULTURKAL FRAUDS. . 27] 
fools only; they do not sell to anybody else. Now, I think the law 
he has asked for would be impracticable. Of course, we would 
like to have our business protected; we would like to have all the 
frauds kept out or killed—don’t care much which—but there are so 
: many things in the way, so many branches to be protected, that 
E itis impossible to protect them all by law in the way that this gen- 
‘5 tleman proposes. 
i, Ihave thought that the nurseryman and the jeweler, the watch 
Ps tinker, were about on a level in their ability to perpetrate frauds on 
2 the public. I know of a man who was coming down this way from 
‘ Dakota, and on the way he found that his watch had stopped. He 
. took it to a jeweler to be repaired and put in running order. The 
7 jeweler opened it, put on his eye-glass, and said, “Thereis a jewel 
broken in your watch; it cannot run untilit is fixed.” He supposed 
the man would leave his watch to be repaired. The man happened 
to be in a hurry, so he asked the jeweler how long it would take to 
fix it, and the jeweler said it would take a day or two. The man 
could not wait that long,so he came on to Owatonna. (They are 
all honest in Owatonna, and some of you may be living there.) 
He took it to a jeweler there who put on his eye-glass and looked 
into the watch. Then he took his little pincers and picked a little 
hair out of the hair spring, a little piece of hair that had become 
entangled in the hair spring, handed it back to the man, and it was 
allright. Wecould not go to work and pass laws preventing watch 
tinkers committing fraud; it would be impracticable. I think the 
~ 
Gh ae? + 3/5 5 aga is 
7 best thing we can do is to educate our people to just as high a 
7 standpoint as we can and take things as they come. (Applause.) 
= Mr. Harris: I would suggest to Brother Dartt that instead of hav- ~ 
: ing the fools killed we have them educated. 
* Mr. Pearce: An old fellow used to tell me that experience taught 
us that fools could learn as well asothers. I think we stand on an 
equal foundation. Fraud is punishable in any form in this state. 
All we have to do is to take the proper course of law, and we can put 
a any kind of a fraud through. People must become educated; they 
must learn to know what the law is; they must use their own minds, 
their own judgment. Until they do that, we-can passall the laws we 
wish, and still they will be defrauded. Now, we want no law except 
what we have, a law to punish fraud. We want our Wisconsin 
nurserymen to come in and sell; we want Iowa nurserymen to come 
in and sell; we want everybody to come into our state and sell their 
Z goods, if they do it honestly, if they tell just what it is, so that 
every man,every one that buys trees or fruits can tell just what they 
are getting. Now,I want to stand on my own responsibility, account- 
able for everything I do, and that is just where every nurseryman 
should stand. I am not accountable for other frauds; I am not ac- 
countable for what another man does; if you go to deceive and de- 
fraud, aminnocent. I hope this matter will rest just where it is. 
Mr. Kimball: I feel much interested in this matter, and feel like 
doing something to help protect my friends and neighbors. What 
Mr. Pearce says may be true, but when a party comes in from 
another state and represents to my neighbors that this or that is the 
proper thing to do,and they have not the experience to know whether 
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