UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



4 BULLETIN No. 547 



Contribution from Office of Markets and Rural Organization 

 £&&"'^J , U CHARLES J. BRAND, Chief 



Washington, D. C. 



September 19, 1917 



COOPERATIVE PURCHASING AND MARKETING OR- 

 GANIZATIONS AMONG FARMERS IN THE UNITED 

 STATES. 



By 0. B. Jesness, Assistant in Cooperative Organization, and W. H. Kerr, Ivesti- 

 gator in Market Business Practice. 



CONTENTS. 



;* 



Page. 

 Early history and growth of cooperative 



organization 1 



Present forms and tendencies 3 



Statistics of cooperation 11 



Cooperation in representative States 37 



Representative types of cooperative organiza- 

 tions 41 



Financing and business practices 50 



Agencies which assist cooperation 59 



Cooperative laws 61 



Cooperative law summations 62 



Digest of State cooperative laws 67 



The Clayton Amendment to the United 



States antitrust laws 77 



Selected list of publications on cooperative 



purchasing and marketing 78 



EARLY HISTORY AND GROWTH OF COOPERATIVE ORGANIZATION. 



FOUNDATION. 



While cooperative organization among the farmers of the United 

 States usually is regarded as a movement of recent origin, farmers' 

 organizations existed in this country as early as the latter part of 

 the eighteenth century. The need for organized effort, however, 

 did not become very apparent until about the middle of the nine- 

 teenth century. The first half of the nineteenth century was a 

 period of rapid development in agriculture as well as in other indus- 

 tries, but in so far as the farmer was concerned it was largely a 

 period of individual development. The need felt by the farmer for 

 organized effort about 1850 gave rise to a number of attempts at 

 cooperative purchasing and also brought about the promotion of a 

 number of cooperative stores. Coincident with this movement 

 among farmers, a similar movement was inaugurated in certain of 

 the cities. The establishment of cooperative stores among the fac- 

 tory employees in England had proved so successful that employees, 

 especially in New England cities, profiting by the experience of the 



85964°— Bull. 547—17 1 



