COLLECTIVE BARGAINING 141 



which had "unlawfully assumed to control the milk mar- 

 ket by arbitrarily fixing prices and other means to the 

 detriment of the producers and consumers." ^ The activi- 

 ties of the union were confined principally to the organi- 

 zation of locals for some years after this. 



The union was still in existence in 1897 ^ when excite- 

 ment over a gigantic milk trust said to be forming in New 

 York * gave fresh Impetus to activity among the milk pro- 

 ducers and resulted in 1898 in the formation of the Five 

 States Milk Producers' Association ^ which before the end 

 of that year attained a membership of 3,715 producers.* 

 The building of local creameries was urged as a means 

 of combating the city dealers.® In 1899 the association 

 numbered eight thousand members, representing owner- 

 ship of two hundred thousand cows,^ and controlling 

 twenty thousand of the twenty-five thousand cans of milk 

 daily shipped to New York City.* 



A big contract was made with The Consolidated Milk 

 Company, which was to purchase the milk from the as- 

 sociation at a higher price than the dealers' organization 

 would pay,' but this company failed to live up to its con- 

 tract,^" and the producers were compelled to make terms 

 with the milk dealers. That such terms were not satis- 

 factory to the former is evidenced by the unrest among 



' Cultivator and Country Gentleman., Oct. 1$, 1891. 



* Ohio Farmer, Dec. 23, 1897. 



' HoarSs Dairyman, Sept. 24, 1897; Mar. 4, 1898. 



* Cultivator and Country Gentleman, Mar. 24, 1898; Neio York Produce Review, 

 July 3, 1901. 



' Ibid., Oct. 27, 1898. 

 'Ibid. 



' New York Pro. Rev. y American Creamery, Mar. 29, 1899. 

 ' Hoard^s Dairyman, June 5, 1919. 

 'Ibid. 

 " Ibid., Apr. 14, 1899. 



