64 A HISTORY OF NATIONAL TUBERCULOSIS ASSOCIATION 



standards and bringing them to the agencies interested in tuber- 

 culosis. 



Fourthly, the Christmas seal has been the means of attracting 

 to the tuberculosis movement the most diversified interests of the 

 community. Labor unions and industrial and religious organiza- 

 tions, school children, women's clubs and societies, bankers and 

 bakers, in fact all the elements of American community life have 

 contributed not only financially but in many other ways to mak- 

 ing the Christmas seal sale a success. The Christmas seal, in 

 other words, furnishes an opportunity for everyone, rich and poor, 

 high and low, to participate in the community program for the 

 prevention of tuberculosis. 



In the conduct of the Christmas seal sale the policy of relations 

 between the National Tuberculosis Association and the state and 

 local groups has been the deciding factor in the success of the seal 

 sale. As is implied in the correspondence passing between Mr. 

 Bicknell and Dr. Farrand, the original policy of the Christmas 

 seal sale was that the money derived from the sale of seals shall 

 so far as possible remain in the community where the seals are 

 sold. There have been varying degrees of modification of this 

 policy. The National Tuberculosis Association at the present 

 time makes a fixed contract with each of the state associations 

 whereby a definite percentage from the gross sale of seals is paid 

 into the treasury of the National Association. Arrangements be- 

 tween state and local associations vary in different states. In 

 some the percentages are high and in some they are low. They 

 range anywhere from 10 per cent, over and above the percentage 

 to the National Association to as high as 40 per cent, or even 

 50 per cent. In unorganized territory where there is no associa- 

 tion and no agency for expending the funds in approved ways, it 

 is customary in most instances for the state association to take all 

 of the proceeds and spend them for the benefit of the local com- 

 munity or hold them in trust for an organization to be developed. 

 Thus, out of every dollar's worth of seals sold in city or town, a 

 percentage goes to the support of both national and state work as 

 well as local work. The returns from the Christmas seal by years, 

 beginning with 1907, are as follows: 



