60 PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SIXTH FRUIT-GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



to me that it is necessary to go to the Legislature and ask that a statute 

 be drafted giving producers power to form such organizations, and in 

 such a manner that the courts will not declare them in opposition to 

 public policy. That is one of the most important matters, I think, we 

 have to deal with, as fruit-growers in California. It applies, as I have 

 said, to all such products as should be handled by fixing the price and 

 maintaining a market. It does not necessarily apply to the producers 

 of deciduous or fresh fruits or perishable articles, but it does apply, and 

 is necessary, where you seek to fix a price and maintain it, and a very 

 large part of our productions is of that character. This would not only 

 apply to fruit products, but it would apply to every other product that 

 California is capable of yielding to this country. Our wheat-growers 

 are endeavoring in some way to put their business on a paying basis, 

 and such a law as this would also be the means of helping them out. 



I would suggest that this Convention recommend to the next Legis- 

 lature that it pass a law which will enable the fruit-growers to form 

 an organization which will not be in opposition to the law of the land, 

 and which will enable them to stay together. 



MR. RIGHTER. I would like to know if the reason these people 

 won't come in is because they have not got the money, and they don't 

 see any means of coming into the association? 



MR. KEARNEY. In answer I will say that we have established a 

 system in handling our products by which the grower makes a draft 

 upon the association, payable out of whatever funds are received by us 

 from the sale of his crop. That draft he can cash at any bank or he 

 can get it cashed by his bankers who are handling his property, and, 

 therefore, there is never any trouble about his getting, say fifty per cent 

 of the value of his crop advanced, and very often seventy-five per cent 

 of the value of his crop is paid to him in advance of its being sold. 



DR. SHERMAN. I want to correct a few impressions that you 

 might get from the talk by Mr. Kearney, and I speak from the stand- 

 point of the grower. We believe that this organization can be kept 

 intact if the right policy is pursued, and it is simply, in my judgment, 

 and in the judgment of the growers with whom I have conversed, a 

 matter of difference in regard to the policy of the association. And to 

 demonstrate to you the loyalty of the growers and their desire to stand by 

 the association and to preserve its integrity and its organization, I will say 

 to you that they unanimously this year were of one opinion and of one 

 desire to maintain the integrity of the organization; and as a demon- 

 stration of their loyalty, they delivered their raisins to the association 

 this year when they could have had a higher price on the outside. I 

 was offered 4 cents for my raisins on the outside for the whole crop in 

 the sweat-box, and I delivered them for less than 3 cents to the associa- 



