COOl'KKATIVK COKi'OKATIONS. 223 



purchases from stockholders, who were to be paid from the 

 sales of the canned goods. In due time they were shipped, 

 and rejected; they had not been properly put up, and were 

 spoiled; meantime canned goods had advanced, and the pur- 

 chasers insisted on delivery of sound goods, according to 

 contract; this the corporation was unable to do, and those to 

 whom they had sold bought elsewhere, at much higher prices, 

 charging the difference to the cooperative society, against 

 which they obtained judgment; and the outcome of the whole 

 business to the stockholders was an entire loss of their crop, 

 which was spoiled, and an assessment to pay for all the other 

 material and labor used, as well as the machinery and other 

 permanent plant, which was worth next to nothing at forced 

 sale; and in addition to all this, there were large sums due as 

 damages to those to whom they sold goods, but could not 

 deliver. A single individual, in such a case, would simply 

 surrender his property, go through insolvency, and begin 

 again; the stockholders in this corporation, however, being 

 all farmers with more or less property, were generally "good" 

 for their share of the loss, which was put into judgments against 

 them, and gradually collected. 



The above illustrations are given to show the causes of 

 failure, and the dangers of cooperative work; in one case, the 

 trouble arose because the stockholders did not attend to and 

 sustain their own business; in the last, because they engaged 

 in a risky business, which they did not understand; in both 

 cases, the stockholders alone were responsible; they could have 

 sustained the business which was suitable for them, and could 

 have kept out of the other. In both cases they were better 

 off in an incorporated society than they would have been 

 without incorporation. It is not "corporations" which farmers 

 have to fear, but irresolution and foolishness. 



No corporation can lawfully engage in any business which 

 is not specified in its articles of incorporation. The first step, 

 therefore, toward safety in cooperative corporations is to exactly 

 specify in those articles the business to be engaged in, in such 

 terms as to exclude everything else. It is a common practice, 

 in drawing these articles, to make them very general in their 



