THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
i89o 
4i x 
TO PROTECT PLANTSMEN. 
R ESPECTFULLY presented by the Rural New-Yorker and Tiie American 
Garden for the careful consideration of the Horticulturists of America for dis¬ 
cussion and revision, adaptation or adoption and recommendation to the attention of 
the Congress of the United States. 
THE RURAL PUBLISHING CO., TIMES BUILDING, NEW YORK. 
AN ACT to secure to the Originators and Introducers of New and Valuable 
Varieties of Plants a proper share of the benefits resulting from their 
labors and expenses in connection with such new varieties, and to 
protect the public from fraud In the purchase and sale of plants. 
RURAL SPECIAL CROP REPORTS. 
Florida. 
Gabriella, Orange County, June 3.— 
W T e have been having very peculiar weather 
here this and last year. The winter of 
1888-9 was very wet, the spring and autumn 
of 1889 were very droughty. Indeed, the 
drought was phenomenal, lasting until 
nearly the end of last April. But, to cap 
the climax, while the drought was most 
intense and seemed likely to cause general 
destruction, along came two freezes in 
March, a state of things heretofore un¬ 
known in the history of this section. These, 
especially the last, seemed to complete the 
destruction, but, strange to say, numerous 
localities escaped with slight damage. 
Rains came in the la«t days of April, 
orange and lemon and other trees bloomed, 
and now the prospects are favorable for 
good crops, taking the State as a whole. 
We are now in the midst of the rainy sea¬ 
son, and everything is growing with as¬ 
tonishing vigor, rapidly obliterating all 
indications of the damage done by the 
droughts and freezes. The farmers are very 
busy planting sweet potatoes, peas, etc., 
the staple crops, and a good degree of in¬ 
terest is being awakened in the cultivation 
of rice. The lessons of the past two years are 
being heeded, and what seemed to be adver¬ 
sities will prove to be of lasting benefit to 
the State at large, though individuals have 
suffered severely. The first lesson taught 
is the more general growing of staple crops 
for home supplies, such as potatoes, peas, 
rice, cassava, sugar cane, all varieties of 
garden vegetables and feed for stock. The 
second lesson is, the imperative necessity 
of irrigation, which can be used very 
cheaply here. A third, is the great value 
of drained muck lands for the growing of 
vegetables. S. A. 
PATERNALISM. 
The most notable feature of socialism 
iu the politics of to day, both in this 
country and Europe, is paternalism—the 
intermeddling of the government with 
affairs which, according to long-established 
usage, should be left to private initiative. 
For years the State has been taking more 
and more interest, not only in feeding and 
educating the poor; bnt also in securing for 
them or allowing themselves to secure fair 
terms of employment. Less than a century 
ago there wasn’t a country in Europe in 
which a strike of several thousand work¬ 
ing-men in favor of higher wages or shorter 
hours of labor would not have been 
promptly suppressed by the military. Now, 
not only are strikes allowed everywhere, 
except in autocratic Russia, but arbitra¬ 
tion committees and other official or semi¬ 
official bodies endeavor to obtain for the 
strikers at least a large part of their de 
mands. Laws which, two or three genera¬ 
tions ago, would have been bitterly de¬ 
nounced as socialistic, are now regarded as 
wise and beneficial. What is more social¬ 
istic than the post-office ; yet what is more 
justifiable ? In several European countries 
the telegraph and railroad systems are 
wholly or in part under government con¬ 
trol, and the arrangement, though fla¬ 
grantly socialistic, instead of producing the 
disastrous consequences predicted by the 
extreme anti-socialists, appears to give as 
fair a measure of general satisfaction as 
should be reasonably expected from any 
undertaking under the present system of im¬ 
perfect human management. The duty of 
the State to see to the education of the 
people—a purely socialistic doctrine—is 
nearly everywhere recognized. Many ef the 
States even venture to interfere now and 
then with |the sacred right of oppressive con¬ 
tracts, and in the ordinary affairs of life to 
substitute State help for self-help, or rather 
to supplement one with the other. Several 
notable cases of such legislation have oc¬ 
curred of late years iu the United King¬ 
dom, Germany and France, and few of a less 
conspicuous type in some other European 
countries; but some of the most remark¬ 
able instances of socialistic legislation are 
among the measures recently introduced 
into the United States Congress or advo¬ 
cated by large bodies of our people, and most 
of them find special favor among the agri¬ 
cultural classes. There is room here for 
only a brief reference to a few prominent 
specimens of such measures. 
The scheme which the Farmers’ Alliance 
has been persistently urging upon Congress 
looking to the establishment of a multitude 
of government warehouses throughout 
the country, in which farmers could de¬ 
posit their produce and borrow from the 
government 80 per cent, of its value at a 
nominal rate of interest, is eminently so¬ 
cialistic. So are the McClammy House 
bill and the Stanford Senate bill authoriz¬ 
ing the loan of enormous sums from the 
National Treasury at one or two per cent, 
interest on the security of farm mortgages. 
So is the measure advocated by the farmers 
of Iowa, Kansas and several other Western 
States prohibiting the foreclosure of mort¬ 
gages on farm property. This has a very 
large support in the trans-Mississippi 
States. It provides that debts secured by 
mortgage on real estate shall not be 
collected by the processes of foreclosure 
now prevalent in most of the States -, but 
in a novel and very socialistic way. The 
mortgage creditor shall get from the office 
of the register of deeds where the mortgag® 
is recorded, a certified abstract of title of 
the mortgaged estate and a record of the 
encumbrances upon it. The county clerk 
shall certify to the same, ’‘providing, after 
examination, the property is found to be 
worth the full amount of the mortgage.” 
The abstract of title is to be placed on file 
in the county treasurer’s office. That offi¬ 
cial, upon presentation of the abstract, 
shall issue a draft upon the Treasurer of 
the United States for the amount of the 
mortgage debt, including interest and fee. 
This draft is to be payable on demand, and 
the amount is to be charged against the 
estate, on which the government is to have 
a lien. The debtor shall have 20 years in 
which to pay up, provided he pays interest 
at the rate of one per cent, a year. The 
record of the mortgage shall be marked: 
“Settled by the United States Govern¬ 
ment.” This shall be the only lawful way 
of collecting mortgage debts until the ag¬ 
gregate circulation of lawful money in the 
United States shall amount to $50 per 
capita of the population, not counting the 
lawful reserves in the banks and other 
fixed non-circulating deposits required by 
law. When the $50 limit is reached, the 
old methods of foreclosure shall be re¬ 
sumed, but the government shall step in as 
a kind-hearted creditor whenever the in¬ 
crease of population shall require “ the 
further floating of new money to preserve 
the even, unfluctuating aggregate of $50 per 
capita,” and provisions are made for atten¬ 
tion to this matter by the U. S. Treasurer. 
The Farmers’ Alliance of Benedict, Ne¬ 
braska, asks the State Board of Transporta¬ 
tion to cut down freight rates on railroads 
to a point where they “will be able to ob¬ 
tain a living price” for their products. 
“ We will have you know,” they tell the 
Board, “ that you are our servants, not our 
masters. You have one chance, and only 
one, obedience to the will of the people. 
That’s what this government meant when 
founded, and we are going to start things 
from the foundation again.” Another 
anti-railroad measure of wide popularity 
insists that the railroads should share with 
the farmers and business men in any de¬ 
pression in prices. According to the sup¬ 
porters of this project, a railroad has no 
right to charge the same freight for corn 
wheu it is selling at 22 cents per bushel, 
that was charged when it sold for 60 cents 
per bushel. The only way to effect this is 
to allow the railroads to charge only a cer¬ 
tain percentage of the selling price of the 
freight. “By this means the freight rates 
will be on a sliding scale, rising with high 
prices and falling with low prices.” The 
Farmers’ Alliance of Minnesota has lately 
given voice to a socialistic project which 
has for years been advocated by thousands 
of farmers in the West. It urges the gen¬ 
eral government to construct from one to 
three great transcontinental railroads, 
which shall be operated by the government 
at rates of freight low enough to permit 
the profitable shipment of the surplus pro¬ 
ducts of the tributary country to the sea¬ 
board States or to foreign countries. Such 
roads would also act as checks to prevent 
other trunk lines operated by private enter¬ 
prise, from making extortionate freight or 
passenger rates. 
These are simply fair specimens of a large 
number of socialistic projects advocated by 
local, State or National farmers’ organiza¬ 
tions. Of course, numerous strong objec¬ 
tions can be urged against every one of 
them. Indeed, some of them,especially those 
directed against the railx-oads, are prepos¬ 
terously one-sided and unfair with regard 
to the rights of other industries. It has been 
said that the lesson taught by the great 
French Revolution—that odb man’s rights 
end where those of another begin—was 
worth all the wild horror of that terrible 
upheaval; but multitudes of people appear 
never to have even heard of it. A good deal 
of sound sense underlies most of the above 
schemes, however, and elaborated and 
amended so as to eliminate all injustice to 
any class or industry, many of them will, 
no doubt, be hereafter embodied in Na¬ 
tional or State legislation; for, not infre¬ 
quently, the folly of to-day is the wisdom 
of to-morrow. 
Sec, 1. —Necessity for the Law. 
Whereas, one of the first objects of the 
Government of the United States is to pro¬ 
tect their citizens in the enjoyment of the 
rights of labor, and 
Whereas, the originators and introducers 
of mechanical appliances, and the origin 
ators and introducers of books and period¬ 
icals, etc., are already so protected by the 
copyright and patent laws, and 
Whereas, the origination and introduc¬ 
tion of new varieties of plants are of great 
value to the nation and are the direct results 
of study, research, labor and expense, and 
Whereas, there is no natural protection 
for such labor and expense, and on the 
contrary the very nature of plants renders 
them capable of being cheaply and easily 
propagated, often to the express injury of 
•the originator and introducer under the 
present lack of protection, and 
Whereas, unprincipled men do constantly 
obtain early specimen or duplicate plants 
and seeds, etc., of such new varieties, and 
rapidiy propagate them solely for the pur¬ 
poses of gain to themselves, and by such 
rapid propagation often to the injury of 
the vitality of the plants so propagated, 
and consequently to the injury of the 
reputation of the variety and the reputa¬ 
tion of its originator and injury to the 
persons buying such plants, and 
Whereas, unscrupulous persons, for 
the purposes of dishonest gain, do fre¬ 
quently introduce and sell old and some¬ 
times worthless varieties of plants under 
new or false names and descriptions,, 
thereby deceiving the public into the pur¬ 
chase of the seeds and plants of such 
varieties at increased and fictitious prices, 
and bringing legitimate trade into dis¬ 
repute, and injuring honest growers and 
meichants: 
Sec. 2. —Testing Stations. 
Therefore be it enacted as follows: 
The Secretary of Agriculture is hereby in¬ 
structed to invite the several State Ex¬ 
periment Stations which are in receipt 
of appropriations from the general Govern¬ 
ment to co-operate in the work outlined 
herewith, and in the event of their refusal, 
tacit or direct, the Secretary is hereby 
authorized to organize, locate, or designate 
other Testing Stations, at public institu¬ 
tions or on private farms whose proprietors 
will thus co-operate with the Government 
for the purposes of this Act. 
Sec. 3 .—Sending to Stations Under 
Secretary’s Label. Prelim inary 
Certificate for Protection. 
Originators or discoverers of new varieties 
of useful or ornamental plants not prev¬ 
iously offered for public sale shall have the 
privilege of sending samples or specimens 
of seeds, cuttings, bulbs, roots and plants 
originated or discovered and propagated by 
them, under the label of the Secretary, to 
each of said Testing Stations, which by 
agreement with the Secretary of Agricul¬ 
ture shall have engaged to make careful 
trials of the same as hereinafter specified. 
A written application to the Secretary of 
Agriculture from the originator or dis¬ 
coverer giving a sworn description of a new 
variety and its origin, and accompanied by 
a fee of $1.00, shall entitle him to a Prelim¬ 
inary Certificate which shall set forth his 
claims to proprietary right in the said 
variety, and protect him in such right 
until such time as a full Certificate of 
Registry may be issued for the same by 
the Secretary of Agriculture, Provided 
that the said originator or discoverer 
shall send the specimen seeds, bulbs, roots 
or cuttings to the Testing Stations under 
the label furnished by the Secretary of 
Agriculture within a period of six months 
following the date of said preliminary cer¬ 
tificate. The originator or discoverer shall 
also furnish to the Board of Experts on the 
request of the Secretary, a specimen plant, 
seeds, fruits, bulbs or other product of his 
variety, for the purposes of indentification 
and registry. 
Sec. 4 .—Conditions of Trial. 
The Secretary of Agriculture shall make 
arrangements with the Testing Stations to 
receive seeds, plants, cuttings, bulbs or 
roots of new varieties and to make careful 
trial of the same by cultivation and com¬ 
parison with standard varieties unde” 
proper physical conditions for the various 
sections and localities, and to make period¬ 
ical itemized reports of such trials to the 
Secretary. 
Sec. 5 .—Board of Examiners. 
The Secretary of Agriculture shall cause 
the reports of trials of varieties of plants 
received from the Testing Stations to be 
received by a Board of Experts skilled in 
the scientific and practical characteristics 
of cultivated plants, which Board or 
Bureau he is hereby authorized to organize 
from among the specialists in the employ 
of the Department of Agriculture in¬ 
cluding private citizens, also specialists 
who shall be invited with full power to act 
with the Board, which shall hold periodical 
sessions at such times and of such duration 
as the Secretary shall determine. 
Sec. 6. —llegister of Cultivated Plants. 
Certification of Varieties. Certifi¬ 
cate of Introduction. 
This Board of Experts shall carefully ex¬ 
amine and compare the reports of trials 
of varieties received from the Testing 
Stations, shall give a simple and character¬ 
istic name to each variety, (preference 
be'ng given to the name desired by the 
owner) which official name shall be entered 
in a Register of Cultivated Plants aloDg 
with a brief account of its origin, the name 
of its originator or discoverer, its botanical 
name, its local or synonymical names and 
its economic characteristics as shown by 
the Station trials. The Secretary of Agri¬ 
culture shall, upon the recommendation of 
the Board of Experts, issue a Certificate to 
the originator or discoverer of any useful 
variety of plants when in their judgment 
the same is merited, and after payment of 
a fee of $25 to the Department, which Cer- 
i ificate shall be duly numbered and regis¬ 
tered in the archives of the Department 
and shall secure to the originator or dis¬ 
coverer or his assignees, the sole right of 
propagation and sale of such certificated 
variety for a period of 10 years following 
its date. The Secretary of Agriculture 
shall also issue a Certificate of Introduc¬ 
tion to any citizen of this country who 
shall introduce a valuable new variety of 
plant from a foreign country, which shall 
be tested or reported by the Testing Stations 
and approved and registered by the Board 
of Experts in the same manner as above 
provided for varieties originated or dis¬ 
covered in the L nited States of America, 
after payment of a fee of $25 to the Depart¬ 
ment, and when he shall have proven that 
he has parted with a valuable consideration 
for such variety to the originator or dis¬ 
coverer in said foreign country, and shall 
have proven that the said variety has not 
been in general cultivation or offered for 
general public sale in any foreign country. 
Said Certificate of Introduction shall pro¬ 
tect the introducer or his assignees for a 
period of five years in the propagation of 
the variety in this country. 
Sec. 7.—Register to Include all Culti¬ 
vated Plants. 
The Secretary of Agriculture is hereby 
direc ted to make the Register of Cultivated 
Plants complete by the entry of all varie¬ 
ties of plants under cultivation, their classi¬ 
fication and description under their best 
known and authoritative names; also to 
collect prepared specimens, photographs or 
sketches of the varieties for purposes of 
identification not above provided for 
Copies of the Register of Cultivated Plants 
and its yearly appendixes shall be pre¬ 
pared and furnished gratis to the libraries 
of Testing Stations, the State Agricultural 
( olleges, the Government Departments 
and to such other institutions, societies and 
agencies as the Secretary of Agriculture 
may elect on account of services rendered 
in the furnishing of information found 
valuable in its preparation. To all other 
people copies of the Register shall he sold 
at a price to be fixed by the Secretary of 
Agriculture, provided that the said price 
be enough to cover at least the extra cost 
of printing and furnishing these copies ad¬ 
ditional to those above specified. 
Sec. 8. —Penalties for Infringement. 
Any person found guilty of unlawfully 
propagating or offering for sale any seeds, 
bulbs, roots, plants or cuttings of any va¬ 
riety of plant protected by the Certificate 
of the Secretary of Agriculture, either 
under its proper or a fictitious name, shall be 
deemed guilty of a misdemeanor and pun¬ 
ishable in the same penalties as pertain in 
cases of infiingement of the laws of the 
United States governing patent rights. It 
is provided, however, that lawful purchase 
shall entitle the holder to propagate such 
plants for his own use and the sale of the 
products thereof, excepting such as may be 
used as a means of propagation. 
Sec. 9. 
The sum of $50,000 is hereby appropriated 
for the purposes of this Act. 
Sec. 10. 
This Act shall take effect and be in force 
immediately upcu its passage and approval 
by the President 
