The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
785 
A Discussion of Plans for 
Selling, Milk 
its own members for milk produced and sold in its 
own territory for local consumption without embar¬ 
rassment to producers anywhere else. There can be 
no profit to the League in a situation in which its 
members must accept nearly a cent a quart less price 
for milk than is paid in the same local city to non¬ 
producers. We would suggest a more thorough local 
organization in Schenectady, with provisions to 
andjust and manage its own local sales. 
Experience in Selling Farm Produce 
Since reading on page 543 of Tiie It. N.-Y. “Some 
Solid Truths About Business” by a North Dakota 
man. I thought I would write a few things as we find 
them in Maine. 
A few years ago we bad a few pears to marked also 
a neighbor had a few to market. The neighbor packed 
his in barrels and sent them to a commission merchant 
in Boston, Mass. A large part of the surplus pro¬ 
duced by a large number of small places, such as fruit, 
veal, butter, eggs and poultry, both alive and dressed, 
goes to the commission men in Boston, and I doubt not 
that a goodly portion of it finds its way back to Maine 
again. At the same time we put our pears in barrels 
and sent them to a friend about 75 miles further nor.ili 
in Maine. The neighbor received 25c per bbl. for his 
pears—not enough to pay for the barrel. Our friend 
had to drive about two miles to the railroad station to 
get the pears. He took 'the heads out of the barrels 
and started home. On reaching home he had very few 
pears left. lie sent us $7.40 per bbl. after deducing 
the charges. 
A little way back, having 25 lbs. of good butter to 
dispose of, and hearing that in a certain village at some 
distance from here they were selling butter for 65c and 
70c, we drove there to sell the butter. On arriving at 
the store we found it necessary to urge them quite hard 
to take the butter. They did so at 52c. Very shortly 
after we had been paid and taken our empty butter 
box we learned that they sold it for 70c. This was 
nearly two years ago; since then we have been and 
now are trying to sell to the consumer direct, but have 
only partially succeeded. We have tried through the 
Chamber of Commerce and Houeswives’ League of 
Portland, Me., to get in touch with the consumer, but 
they made no reply to our letters, although at the time 
(hey were making a great spread to have the farmers 
drive to the city on certain days and giving them cer¬ 
tain streets to line up to the curbstone so the people 
could buy direct. We live about 60 miles from that 
city, so cannot sell direct in that way. 
This is the second season we have sent butter every 
Monday morning by parcel post to a few customers in 
the State of New Jersey. The cost is 15 cents for two 
1 ounds. It is strange we have been unable to get in 
touch with those nearer home in the New England 
States. 
Our last venture was on March 1 to send 20 lbs. of 
butter to commission men in Boston. In the cartons 
with each pound of butter we put a slip of paper 
with this on it: “To the Consumer: If you like 
this butter, write and tell us what you pay for it.” 
We are of the opinion that the commission man took 
the slips out before the selling—from a note inclosed 
with the check, which sounded like sarcasm. 
Having a few barrels of nice apples to sell last Fall, 
it looked like the best proposition to take them to the 
cannery in a neighboring town. We did so. and thereby 
learned something. The apples were weighed by their 
man. W hen we got our check we thought they had 
made a mistake in figuring, the check being smaller 
than we looked for. ()n writing the foreman about it, 
he very kindly figured it all out and sent us the slip 
of paper. Ilis work was correct, but Maine 132 lbs. 
of apples are a barrel and the canning shop says “135 
lbs. a barrel.” So the farmer who takes in 'to the 
cannery 44 barrels gets pay for 43 barrels. 
Maine. f. m. sawyer. 
We seem to have no definite and generally accepted 
milk dairy policy. About a year ago Bradley Fuller, 
speaking for the organization, said that the policy of 
the Dairymen’s League was fundamentally wrong. 
It has not been changed since. The Dairymen’s League 
Co-operative Association, then organized, has made 
little or no progress in more than a year, and has not 
been generally accepted. A vote would no doubt show 
a large majority of farmers opposed to it. With such 
opposition or uncertainty, to say the least, it cannot 
be successful, and must ultimately cause confusion, if 
not a conflict of interests. The dealers have the long 
end of the stick at the present time, and we need a 
policy on which all producers can unite to defeat them. 
The Rural New-Yorker has given long and careful 
study to this problem. The original plan was successful 
in the first fight with the dealers. Our members would 
like you to give a resume of this plan, with any modi¬ 
fications that recent experience suggests. My recollec¬ 
tion is that the plan'you published two years ago was 
full and comprehensive. e. n. 
New York. 
PROVISIONS OF TIIE PLAN.—The original plan 
referred to embraced the following provisions: 
1. Incorporation of all the local branches on co¬ 
operative plan to own and control and operate the 
local plant wherever the volume of milk would war¬ 
rant the building or purchase of a plant. Where the 
volume of milk is small or when a dealer’s plant 
cives satisfaction, the existing arrangement may be 
continued. In any case, the option to buy or build 
rests with the local members. The inspection, test¬ 
ing and weighing is in the hands of the local organi¬ 
zation. 
Each local must create an agency for the sale of 
buffer and cheese and condensed milk at retail in 
its own plant or in one or more local stores. 
The locals receive the returns for milk and dis¬ 
tribute it to members after deducting the author¬ 
ized revenue, for local expense and for the expense 
of the central body, or League. The dealers are not 
permitted to collect fees for the committee from 
Which they buy milk, and no producer would or could 
escape paying that share of the expense that he helps 
authorize. 
INDIVIDUAL VOTING.—2. The plan provides a 
system of voting by ballot so that every member has 
an opportunity t<5 one vote for all local and central 
officers, and for all important questions submitted 
by referendum. It also provides that all assessments 
be authorized by the membership, and that the col¬ 
lection of revenues be made by the local organiza¬ 
tions for its own expenses and for the needs of the 
central orga n ization. 
SETTING PRICES.—3. The central organization 
or League makes prices and sells all the milk and 
milk products, and apportions the returns so that 
nil members in all cases are treated under similar 
circumstances alike, both as to a market for milk 
and the price received for it. It receives its author¬ 
ity, its power and its revenue from the members 
through their local organizations. 
PRODUCERS IN CONTROL.—4. The plan con¬ 
templates the domination of the city wholesale milk 
market by dairymen through this central sales agen¬ 
cy. and the development of a competition of dealers 
in city distribution. It provides for one or more 
city plants for pasteurizing and bottling milk so that 
pasteurized milk in bottles or cans may be sold at 
stores in every nook and comer of the city. The 
milk must be sold to all at the same price, and inde¬ 
pendent small dealers encouraged to buy the milk 
and deliver it at reasonable cost to the stores. This 
is the only plan yet suggested to create competition 
with the trust, and consequently the only practical 
and permanent plan to take the power of making 
prices out of its hands. 
MANUFACTURING PLANTS.—The best located 
local plants should be equipped to manufacture milk 
products and absorb any surplus that may at times 
appear, but it is provided that the League may, if 
the necessities arise, own and operate one or more 
such plants in the country for general benefit. 
EXPERTS NEEDED.—The League also needs a 
number of experienced milk experts to assist the 
local organizations in tin* building and equipment of 
plants, and also to train new operators, and to visit 
plants on request, to correct difficulties and to avoid 
waste in operation. 
VARIATIONS IN PLANS.—It will be observed 
that the plan later proposed at Utica last year fol- 
b’Wed ibis general line; but differs in some funda¬ 
mental principles. Among these differences are: 
I li st, the new plan creates two organizations to do 
the work of one. Thin is necessarily complicated 
nod expensive, and leads to privileges and discrimi¬ 
nations which must be avoided. Second, it puts the 
ownership and control of all plants in a central body 
instead of leaving local affairs in local bauds. This 
creates a big and complicated organization. At best 
it would be expensive to manage, and if unsuccessful 
it would be ruinous. Third, and most important of 
all, it leaves the city at the mercy of the milk trust, 
with power to keep retail prices high and to restrict 
consumption, and to throw the surplus back on our 
bands. We could reduce production, but we would 
be neglecting our opportunity to develop this great, 
market at our door, and to build up the dairy indus¬ 
try of the State. 
Next week we will discuss the economic and other 
features in more detail. 
Echoes From the Farm Referendum 
Referring to the farm referendum question on page 
201. 1 was asked to lead a discussion in our Grange 
today, and oliose for my subject ‘‘Timely Topics, and 
used the farm referendum. I will give the result, ot 
the vote of Castile Grange 1017. There was a fairly 
good attendance. 
To repeal daylight saving law. 48; to revise agricul¬ 
tural laws, 48: to elect Commissioner of Agriculture 
and of Markets by direct vote. 48; opposed to price¬ 
fixing commissions. 48; to limit damages for animals 
and fowls under dog law. 48; to revise school law, 
ves, 46; no, 2; to approve the referendum. 48. 
G. E. SMITH. 
Several reports of votes in local Granges were of 
like results, and there is no better place to get the 
sentiment of the substantial people of the farm. 
This was the trend of the vote, whether from indi¬ 
viduals or in groups. 
I inclose vote on the referendum for 12 voters. This 
represents the views of all farmers of this place, as 
veil as the 12. We are fast growing indignant at the 
treatment of our industry. If the daylight saving law 
remains, we cannot afford to keep hired men, and will 
produce one-half less than before. Help want city 
homes, and we cannot afford to give it to them. We 
are fast becoming non-partisan. We will in the future 
vote for the square deal for our own business, or for 
tl.e men who will help us get it. If we are to be the 
power behind the throne, we want the throne to look 
straight ahead and to listen to the voice from the rear. 
The referendum is the best and most convincing expres¬ 
sion of our needs and our judgment. F. u. 
New York. 
That is good straight talk. When farmers clearly 
and generally express their demands and sentiments 
the official or party that ignores them will have no 
claim to their support the next time. 
Figuring Milk Prices 
A curious and puzzling condition of affairs with 
respect to milk prices obtains among dairymen supply¬ 
ing the Schenectady market. The League price for the 
first three mouths of the year for 3.6 per cent milk 
averages not quite eight cents at this station, but most 
of the milk is delivered direct to the local dealers at 
their plants in the city, either by truck or team, and 
none of it goes to New York. From the above price 
there is therefore deducted this additional haulage 
charge of 25 to 35 cents per 40-quart can. and the 
producers have received net therefore about 744 cents 
average during the past three months. This is the 
lowest price received by producers in this market, and 
includes probably less than half the local supply. For 
the other producers the price has ranged from eight to 
!P4 cents per quart. Many local dealers express them¬ 
selves generally as not so much concerned about what 
price they pay as that they should all pay the same 
price. It follows that although our product in no way 
competes with or influences the New York market we 
must nevertheless be subjected to the conditions imposed 
by that market. Surely there must he something wrong 
with a system not sufficiently elastic to avoid such 
injustice. 
What puzzles us is why we who have to take League 
prices must pay freight charges to New York on milk 
that not only never goes there at all. but which is 
delivered by us directly to local distributors at their 
plants, and bottled by them for local consumption. In 
other words if a producer should personally deliver his 
milk to—say a Borden’s plant in New York City—he 
would receive for three per cent milk (according to 
the League schedule for March) $3.81 per 100 lbs., and 
at the local station, for shipment to Borden’s. $3.36, the 
difference of course representing the freight. But if he 
delivers his milk direct to a local plant for bottling he 
must still have the freight to New York deducted, 
although the same delivery is made in each case; that 
is. to the buyer’s plant. There can be no question of 
protecting the New York dealer, because there is no 
competition. The only explanation we ever heard 
offered was made by a League representative at a meet¬ 
ing here to the effect that the League viewed with dis¬ 
favor our efforts to obtain a price in excess of the 
League price on account of the dissatisfaction it was 
bound to create among producers in other localities. 
We know that the matter has been taken up repeatedly 
in local League meetings, but without results. We 
would be glad to have an expression of your opinion 
in the matter. CLARENCE JOHNSON. 
New York. 
Our position lias always been, and still is. that 
local producers should bp organized to handle their 
own local affairs in their own way so long as they 
did not interfere with the rights or interests of 
others. The stronger and more independent the 
locals in their own affairs, the better for the organi¬ 
zation as a whole. The business of the central 
organizations is to do for the locals what they are 
not in a position to do for themselves. Any well- 
organized local should he able to tlx the price for 
The Law About Cutting Bee Trees 
I have noticed recently inquiries in your paper as to 
the law concerning the cutting of bee trees, and I think 
the following case will be of interest to your readers. 
The impression is somewhat general that anyone has 
the right to go on the lands of another and cut a bee 
tree, but this is entirely wrong: the owner of the land 
may not have any special right of action for the honey 
in the bee tree, but it is an act of trespass to go upon 
the land and cut the tree. This question was up in 
Tompkins County at the last trial term in March in 
the case of Lewis against Hunt and others. The plain¬ 
tiff. # Mr. Lewis, owned a valuable timber lot, and he had 
suffered from the unlawful cutting of his trees by coon 
hunters and others. Last September, one night after 
dark, he discovered persons just leaving his .wood lot. a 
bee tree cut and fire burning. Mr. Lewis brought suit 
in justice’s court: the defendants interposed a plea of 
title which removed the case to supreme court and it 
was tried at Tthaea by a jury. The jury rendered a 
verdict of $5 to the plaintiff for the damage to his tree, 
and the costs brought the judgment up to $108 70, 
which the defendants have paid. Judge Sweetland con¬ 
ducted the case for the plaintiff, Mr. Lewis, and cited 
authority as well as reason in a powerful plea for pro¬ 
tection to farm property, and invoked the jury to estab¬ 
lish by their verdict the law that farm property may 
have the same protection as property of other classes. 
This verdict establishes the law to be that one cutting a 
bee tree on another’s land is liable for the damage done, 
and this is sound in reason and justice, and meets with 
very general approval. m. 
