146 PROCEEDINGS OF THIRTY-SIXTH FRUIT-GROWERS ' CONVENTION. 



bill which he proposed and had sent to many of the legislatures of the 

 states, and the request was made of them to withhold action until the 

 Eeferee Board, to which this matter had been assigned, made its report 

 and recommendation. The legislatures of the different states paid the 

 compliment of declining to do anything with Dr. Wiley's bill which 

 he said was so necessary, and it did not pass in a single state in the 

 Union. 



The next annual meeting of the National Food and Dairy Congress 

 was called at Denver, in September last. The Referee Board was 

 invited to be present, not to make its report to that body, because it had 

 no right to do it; its report was to be made to the Federal Govern- 

 ment and to the authority that had created the board, but the purpose 

 was, as discovered later, to assail not only the integrity of the members 

 of that board, but their efficiency, and thereby to discredit whatever they 

 did and to create an impression that Dr. Wiley was right. I confess 

 that I wanted to be, and sought to be, a member of that congress. I 

 carried from California an appointment from Governor Gillett. the 

 Governor of this State, an appointment from the State Dairy Bureau 

 of the State, and an appointment from the California State Board of 

 Trade, three appointments from three central authorities, with the 

 thought that if there was any effort on the part of that congress to 

 disqualify me, my credentials would be of such character as would 

 make it impossible. I found that I was somewhat mistaken. It was 

 not a question of courtesy to our Governor nor to these other bodies, 

 it was not a question of right — it was a question of a determination 

 on the part of one man to dominate the congress and to carry the 

 point which he intended to make. With me wont Professor Jaffa of 

 the University of California, but he, having been appointed by the 

 authorities under the Government, was seated and had his vote in the 

 congress. Mr. H. P. Dimond, who accompanied me, carried only the 

 appointment from the Governor. Mr. Dimond and myself fought for 

 one day and one half, in season and out of season, before our credentials 

 were admitted and we were given our proper place on the floor. The 

 purpose of all this is, and I am telling it to show that the conclusion 

 I have reached will before I finish perhaps seem justified: In that 

 congress, each state having three votes, the vote on all critical points 

 without the vote of California, stood 44 to 44, 88 votes being the full 

 number of votes in the congress. If the delegates from California 

 could be disqualified, Dr. Wiley could carry his point. But after Ave 

 were seated as delegates the vote on all critical questions stood 47 to 

 44. I tell this to show how nearly we came to losing the point we Avere 

 trying to make, viz., to support the action of the Referee Board, in 

 whom we had confidence. I said on the floor of that congress that it 

 mattered not what the finding of the Referee Board was, the people of 

 the State of California and the fruit growers of California had 

 expressed their confidence in the ability of those gentlemen, in their 

 efficiency and in their honesty, and whatever the finding might be AA'e 

 would abide by it and adjust the business of fruit curing, fruit raising, 

 and fruit distribution in California to that finding. That was not what 

 Dr. Wiley wanted; he wanted we should stand with him to discredit 

 the board. And I want to say right now that while I have been in 

 conventions for forty years, or nearly, I have never seen so gross an 



