THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



emergency that may arise, it is not 

 advisable to hedge tlie officers around 

 with so many rules that they will be 

 hampered in their work, but we can 

 not think of such a tiling as throw- 

 ing rules to the wind, and depending 

 upon "common sense," or anything 

 approaching that, when one man's 

 common sense is so different from 

 that of his neighbor's. Emergencies 

 arise. One director says do this way. 

 Another says no, do the otlier way. 

 The third has a different plan. This 

 brings about a whole lot of argument 

 and delay. When experience has 

 shown that some certain way is best, 

 let's embody it in the constitution, 

 then when the point comes up again, 

 we can simply say: "The constitution 

 says so and so." That settles it. The 

 majority of the directors, for the past 

 year or more, are probably gifted with 

 as much common sense as any that we 

 will ever secure, yet look at the muss 

 that they got into. I say again, as I 

 have already said, that definiteness on 

 the part of the constitution would 

 have saved all of this trouble. For in- 

 stance, suppose that the constitution 

 had said definitely that resignations 

 of oft'icers must be sent to certain 

 other offices, and accepted, before suc- 

 cessors could be elected. Suppose, 

 still further, that it had said that the 

 directors should have power to fill the 

 office of general manager, let the of- 

 fice become vacant from any cause, 

 not simply Avhen it is made vacant by 

 the removal of that officer for cause. 

 Had the constitution covered thes(^ 

 two points definitely, our attempted 

 election of a successor to Mr. Secor, 

 last year, would not have resulted in 

 the fizzle and fuss that it did. Now 

 that we have seen, to our sori-ow, what 

 may result from leaving it to "com- 

 mon sense" instead of having definite 

 rules, wliy oppose definiteness? 

 Then again, take the matter of 



nominations. On this point the con- 

 stitution is silent. Last year some one 

 used his "common sense" and sent a 

 nomination to the proper olficei", and 

 look at the muss it kicked up. If we 

 had had some rule on this subject all 

 this would have been avoided. I doubt 

 if there is a member of the Associa- 

 tion who does not favor some plan 

 for making nominations. Bro. Root 

 favors a nominating committee of 

 three. Perhaps this is not exactly the 

 place to discuss how nominations 

 should be nnxde, but I might say that 

 I would rather favor the plan that 1 

 outlined last month, that of asking 

 through the bee journals, to have the 

 whole membership take an informal 

 ballot, the two meml)ers receiving the 

 highest number of votes to be the can- 

 didates. I will admit that a committee 

 of three might be chosen who would 

 be better acquainted witli the merits 

 of available candidates, than would 

 the membership at hirge. On the 

 other hand, we must avoid putting too 

 much power into the hands of a few 

 men. The membership at large shoidd 

 be the ruling power. The closer we 

 can get the membership connected 

 Avith the actual management the bet- 

 ter. Nothing woidd be more detri- 

 mental to the organization than to 

 have spring up a feeling that it was 

 managed by a "ring." A nominating 

 committee of three would almost 

 amount to putting the election into 

 their hands. I once proposed having 

 the candidates nominated at the an- 

 nual election, and it was opposed on 

 the ground that it was putting too 

 much power into the hands of the an- 

 nual convention. Putting it into the 

 hands of three men would be still 

 worse in that direction. 



Bro. Root says that the time to talk 

 about these things is not now, I)ut 

 three or four months l)efore next elec- 

 tion. Beg pardon Bro. Root, but any 



