' O / t t •• ' ' >.i ■> ► - • /•_ 5; . ! • * 
The New England Milk Problem 
THE CENTRALIZED PLAN 
A S the local-federated organization begins with the 
producer on the ground and builds up, converse¬ 
ly the centralized corporation begins with the pro¬ 
moters at the top and spreads its authority and 
power outward and downward. It owns the prop¬ 
erty and equipment, and instruments of distribution. 
It tabes over the local plants in existence, builds 
new ones, and buys others. It operates and man¬ 
ages them. It alone decides when and where to 
build or buy or sell and the price to be paid for pur¬ 
chase or sale. It manages these widely distributed 
plants from a central office. If a plant is inefficient, 
there is no way to make those responsible for it bear 
the loss. The burden is distributed to all. 
The machinery of the centralized organization is 
devised by the lawyers and promoters, who later 
manage it. It is so designed that an official group 
can perpetuate themselves in position and power. 
They write their own laws, their own charters, their 
own by-laws, and their own contracts. They vote 
their own salaries, check their own expense bills, and 
make no comprehensive accounting to anyone. The 
plan creates salaried positions for a large army of 
officials and employes, and satisfies the allurement 
of handling other people’s money. 
The centralized organization is one of small 
minority or group control. It is modeled on the plan 
of the political organization. A management is 
formed to perpetuate the official group. Policies are 
adopted, not for the best service to farmers, but to 
strengthen the position of the official management. 
Men are employed, not for any fitness they have for 
the work, but for the influence they may have in 
support of the management and its policies. This 
army of officials and appointees constitutes the man¬ 
agement. The more places that are made, the more 
entrenched the lawyers and promoters. Like the 
■political 'organization it has its boss, who dominates 
the whole force and dictates its policies. Unlike 
the political organization, however, the money to pay 
for it all does mot come out of State or National 
taxes. It comes from industry. Every dollar of it 
in case of a dairy organization comes out of the milk 
pail. 
The centralized organization works behind closed 
doors and guards its secrets. If the members had an 
effective vote, they would not have the information 
to enable them to vote intelligently. The manage¬ 
ment makes no report of its discussions or of votes 
on policies. The members have no way of knowing 
how the directors stand on debatable questions or 
how they vote on policies. The members have only 
the most general information about finances. They 
rarely know the salaries paid their officials and em¬ 
ployes, either in detail or in bulk sum, nor the ex¬ 
penses allowed them. They do not know the re¬ 
tainers and fees and salaries paid lawyers. They 
get no definite report of the cost of property or of 
the expense of operating it. They get no accounting 
of profit or loss when it is sold. The money for all 
these purchases, expenses and operations comes out 
of the members. It is the only trust in the world au¬ 
thorized by law in which the trustees are not obliged 
to make an accounting. 
The centralized farm organization is patterned 
largely after the plan of the capital stock company, 
but it is essentially less efficient and more wasteful 
and extravagant than the capital stock company. 
The latter is controlled by a majority of its capital 
stock. It is run for profit on capital. The manage¬ 
ment represents that capital. It operates for profit 
alone. The members of the centralized farm organi¬ 
zation are widely distributed. They have neither 
the information nor facilities for control. The pur¬ 
pose of the organization is not a definite per cent of 
profit, but a very indefinite service to members. The 
officials liave small investments in it. They are prin¬ 
cipally concerned in their position and salaries. 
Their share of the service, if anything, is compara¬ 
tively small. Officials in a centralized office, no mat¬ 
ter how capable, must depend on an army of em¬ 
ployes distributed over a wide territory. The ex¬ 
pense of doing business on that plan is high. Effi¬ 
ciency is low, and every dollar of the expense and 
waste helps reduce the returns to producers at the 
end of the month. 
The machinery of the centralized organization is 
complicated. It is expensive to manage. It is large 
in volume of business. It soon gets into complica¬ 
tions. Legal troubles develop. Lawyers and experts 
are needed. Their services come high. The business 
drifts and no new capable man wants to take the 
job and assume responsibility for a burdened enter¬ 
prise. The original cost of organization is usually 
RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
staggering, and the cost of maintaining a minority 
controL perpetuates the organization expense. The 
farmer cannot and does not escape a dollar of these 
expenses. 
The centralized plan of farm organization is not 
now a theory. It is not on trial. It is no longer an 
experiment. It is a failure. It has been tried in 
various places. It has no record of success anywhere. 
It failed in the dairy work in Oregon and in Chi¬ 
cago. It failed in the case of the old League and in 
several other instances in New York. It has not 
succeeded in holding dairymen together in the 
reorganization. It failed dismally and completely in 
the ease of the Grain Growers’ Central Organization 
in the West. Two fruit organizations on this plan in 
California are in difficulties. One of them has an 
indebtedness of $18,000,000. It is doubtful if they 
can survive without reorganization. Wisconsin has 
twice repudiated the centralized promoters, one of 
them from New York, and rejected their plans. The 
centralized scheme is rejected and the local-federat¬ 
ed plan approved by the American Farm Bureau 
Federation and the agricultural colleges of Vermont 
and Massachusetts and Wisconsin and Iowa. They 
are in accord with the undisputed x*ecord of success¬ 
ful co-operation the whole world over. 
The centralized plan places its reliance on a prac¬ 
tical monopoly. This is repulsive to the co-operative 
conscience. In case of an agricultural product of 
general production it is impractical and in conflict 
with economic law. The plan seeks alliances with 
middlemen. This is fatal. It is a surrender of its 
influence on the consumptive market. It becomes a 
mere feeder for the dealers, and becomes dependent 
on them for existence. The cost of the organization 
is added to the cost of production and comes out of 
the producer. 
The centralized plan has within itself the germs 
of its own ultimate destruction. It is a minority 
control. It enthrones a king. The central figure is 
necessarily surrounded by capable and sincere men 
outside the inner circle, but the plan requires that 
such men efface themselves. If they are not replaced. 
The farmer who is dissatisfied with the management 
or its policies would stick to an organization con¬ 
trolled by a majority vote of its members because he 
would hope to win a majority to his side later on; 
but when he sees a small group control, he has no 
choice but to submit or get out, or, if not already in, 
to stay out. This is the seed of disintegration. 
Oppressed by the tyranny of middlemen, as well 
as by the extortion, monopoly and centralized power 
of the capital stock corporation, farmers devised co¬ 
operation as a protest against it all. They sought 
an efficient and economic system of distribution for 
themselves, by themselves, for themselves. The cap¬ 
ital stock lawyers and promoters have now come in 
to cheat them out of the fruits of their invention by 
bringing back into the farm organization the very 
methods and policies that farmers sought to escape 
through co-operation. The old system furnished its 
own capital, in part, at least. Under the new scheme 
the farmer furnishes it all. Tested by these stand¬ 
ards, the centralized plan is not co-operative in form 
or in spirit. In essence it is the old capital stock 
corporation, disguised under the name of co-opera¬ 
tion. 
A Book About Old Times 
W E have been reading “The Life and Times of 
►Stephen Girard”—merchant, banker and 
farmer, who, after a miserly life, singularly devoid 
of real friendships, left in 1831 a colossal fortune to 
Pennsylvania and the city of Philadelphia. It was 
an adventurous life, and if we read the story soberly 
and realize the condition of American society a cen¬ 
tury ago, and note the habits and customs of busi¬ 
ness men and politicians, we shall have greater hope 
for the future of our country. It is of course nat¬ 
ural for the older generation to praise the “good old 
times,” and compare them with the business and 
social methods of today. Reading this life of Girard 
will make us hesitate to accept this comparison ex¬ 
actly. In many ways the world is safer and better 
today. It may be that in the extremes of rich and 
poor, the balance of idleness and worthless charac¬ 
ter, or of suffering and injustice, may run against 
this age, but it is evident that the common people 
or great middle class have gained materially in the 
past century. In 1808 the war in Europe interfered 
with commerce, so that Girard let his ships stand 
idle and started farming in New Jersey. It was a 
form of tenant farming, and we are given several 
farm contracts to show how farm wages ran in those 
days. Farm hands who were boarded received from 
37y 2 to 40 cents a day. Each meal was charged at 
; 1133 
12^4 cents. A monthly hand received $8 to $10 per 
month. A first-class hand was paid $110 per year. 
The price for mowing an acre of grass was SO cents, 
and for thrashing a bushel of grain with a flail, 
6 cents. A man and his wife, both working, were 
paid $132 a year, with “bouse room,” six cords of 
firewood, 12 bushels of potatoes and one quart of 
skim-milk per day. The work which the woman was 
to do was specifically stated. She was to cook, wash, 
mend for as many helpers as “Stephen Girard will 
judge proper to employ.” She was also to attend 
market and help the man at his work. These were 
the days when New Jersey ranked as a grain pro¬ 
ducing State, and Europe was largely fed from grain 
fields in New York, Maryland and Virginia. The 
modern hired man with $<>0 or more per month, a 10- 
hour day or less, a ear of Ms own, and pretty much 
the owner of the farm, will smile at these pitiful 
wages, and the day from sunrise to sunset. Yet 
these 40-cent-a-day men mostly saved their money, 
bought farms at home or “out West” and became 
the freeholders of the next generation. In consul- 
ing these things we must remember that in these old 
days this country could furnish free land to all. 
There was always a frontier where, if all else failed, 
a man could go out with an ax and a rifle and be 
ranked among men by his strength and his charac¬ 
ter. So long, as there was this frontier to go to 
men could preserve much of their independence and 
pride as a freeholder. The basic trouble with society 
today is that there is no longer any free land as there 
was in old times, and with this change is passing 
the old-time feeling that no matter what else hap¬ 
pened a man could go to a farm and make an inde¬ 
pendent living for his family. Whenever an American 
comes to believe that he can no longer find a piece 
of land to call his own something vital drops out of 
his character. 
Fire and Robbery 
ORD comes from New Hampshire of a new 
scheme for robbing farmhouses. There have 
been several fires in a country neighborhood, and in 
each case a car was seen driving rapidly away. At 
the alarm all neighbors for several miles around 
hurried to the fire—in some cases buildings were de¬ 
serted. The people came back to find their valuables 
gone. The fires were evidently started to call neigh¬ 
bors away from home so the robbers might have a 
clear field. It is little wonder that, with all these 
multiplied schemes for robbery, farmers are becom¬ 
ing inclined to shoot first and make inquiries later. 
It is a mistake to follow that practice, but without 
question it is growing common. 
More About That Child Labor 
Amendment 
That was a great editorial the other week in Tiie R. 
N.-Y. on the child labor situation. I wish we could get 
it in tract form for distribution. If the people of this 
country do not wake up and do something the labor 
unions and a lot of well-meaning but mistaken people 
who would better be some place under restraint, will 
make this country another Russia. First it was the 
'boards of health and the doctors starting with some very 
necessary sanitary regulations and branching out into 
all sorbs of fool dictatorship, but the educational graft¬ 
ers went them one better, and now, bad as they were 
and are, this child labor amendment seems to have 
reached the limit of officious interference. Verily we 
have come far since the days of Concord and Lexington. 
Pennsylvania. n. B> BEST> 
After reading over the article in the August 0 issue 
concerning the child labor amendment which is now be¬ 
fore the States for adoption, I was satisfied that one 
more publication had joined in the fight against the ab¬ 
surdity of a foolhardy Congress. Talk about the foolish 
bills that have been up before our national legislature 
in the last few months—this one is the limit. I think 
these so-called “reformers” ought to start in with them¬ 
selves, especially those in Congress. If they consider 
labor such a disgrace, why don’t they resign at once and 
let some serious-minded persons enact the laws? 
Being affiliated with the Junior United States Repub¬ 
lic, I feel that I am in a position to voice the opinions 
of its leaders on that important question. After care¬ 
fully weighing the credentials for and against the meas¬ 
ure, they have concluded that it should not become a 
part of the Constitution as it stands without some modi¬ 
fication. I 11 his message to the Junior House of Repre¬ 
sentatives, President Pack wood said he was “opposed 
to the child labor amendment, primarily because it does 
not conform with the original spirit of the American 
Constitution. A law that is passed without the welfare 
of the greatest number at heart is not a law, but an in¬ 
fringement upon the rights of the people.” 
No such measure can ever win the approval of the 
American people, and if the original sponsors wish to 
have it pass they would better see to it that it isn’t put: 
to test by a popular vote. CHARLES E. foroette. 
New York. 
