THE CULTIVATOR: 
A Monthly Publication, devoted to •Igricultuve—each Ko. 16 'pages. 
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Vol. III. ALBANY, DECEMBER, 1830.—(67 State-street.) No. 10. 
PUBLISHED BY THE N. Y. STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
J. BUEL, Conductor. 
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and will be entitled to every eleventh copy, or its equivalent, as commission. 
ITT* The Cultivator, according to the decision of the Post-master General, is 
subject only to newspaper postage, viz: one cent on each number within the 
stale, and within one hundred miles from Albany, out of the state—and one 
and a half cents on each number, to any other part of the Union. 
THE CULTIVATOK. 
To improve the Soil and the Mind. 
LEGISLATIVE ENCOURAGEMENT TO AGRICULTURE. 
We think it is pretty well settled, that the law for distributing, 
among the several states, the surplus monies which shall remain in 
the national treasury on the first day of next month, will not be 
repealed ; and that this state will receive, as her distributive share 
of the fund, if her legislature do not reject the proffered boon, more 
than SIX MILLIONS of dollars. The suggestion that this mo¬ 
ney is to be received in the nature of a loan, to be returned again to 
the national treasury, we deem fallacious. It is an excess, above 
the reasonable wants of the government, and if not distributed, it is 
apprehended, will be uselessly expended. If expended by the states, 
in education, internal improvements and the encouragement of agri¬ 
culture, its benefits will be palpable and abiding. We shall at all 
times be obliged to contribute our share, in one way or another, of 
the expenses of the general government, even if we decline to take 
this six millions—and we shall have to contribute no more than our 
share if we do take them. Hence it admits of no doubt that we 
ought to take the money. But were it even a loan, to be refunded, 
the money will be expended, and will have to be paid, directly or 
indirectly, by the consuming land-holding interest; and it is there¬ 
fore right, from this consideration alone, that a portion of it should 
go to increase the value and products of the land. 
It is important, therefore, to every class of our citizens, that in 
the application of these monies, by our legislature, some permanent 
provision should be made to encourage and improve the labors of 
agriculture. The present time is full of admonition, which cannot 
be misapprehended, that the substantial interests of the state are 
mainly dependant upon her agriculture—that this is in fact the com¬ 
mander, or balance wheel, which controls and regulates all the mi¬ 
nor machinery of society. The present high price of every article 
of farm produce, and our humiliating dependance upon foreign na¬ 
tions for bread stuffs, to avert the evils of famine, should surely 
teach us the necessity of giving to that great branch of national in¬ 
dustry, which feeds and enriches us all, the substantial aid which 
shall stimulate its exertions, instruct and aid its labors, and multiply 
its products. Every dollar judiciously applied to this object, w T ill be 
like seed deposited in a good soil—it will yield its fifty fold and its 
hundred fold; and the increase will alike add to the wealth and 
comforts of all—to the rich and the poor—to the merchant, mecha¬ 
nic, manufacturer and farmer. It will benefit all, because all will 
participate in the general prosperity, which nothing so much pro¬ 
motes as a high state of agricultural improvement. 
We will venture to suggest a proposition for public consideration; 
and we would impress it upon the farming community, and upon all 
others who may approve of the suggestion, to take immediate steps 
to memorialize the legislature, and to instruct their representatives, 
in the matter. The proposition is this, that the legislature be asked 
to appropriate two hundred thousand dollars, or one thirtieth part, 
of the sum which we are expected to receive in January, for the im¬ 
provement of agriculture; and that a portion of this sum, say one 
half or more, be specially set apart to sustain, for a term of years, 
county agricultural societies. 
We will not now stop to prove the utility of agricultural socie¬ 
ties. It would be supererogation. They have won for themselves 
a reputation for usefulness. They have produced the greatest be- 
NO. 10 -VOL. III. 
nefits, to the moral habits as well as to the pecuniary interests, 
of all communities where they have been well conducted. For 
proof of this, we refer to Great Britain, to France, to our sister 
states, and our own state. But they want here, what they re¬ 
ceive elsewhere, to develope all their usefulness—the aid and pa¬ 
tronage of the government. Massachusetts has adopted a liberal 
policy in these matters, and experience has demonstrated its wis¬ 
dom : she gives to her county societies a sum equal to what the in¬ 
habitants of each respectively raise for this purpose ; and she finds 
that these gratuities, after fertilizing her soil, and improving the 
moral condition of her population, flow back to her treasury again 
in increased volume. 
Our remarks upon this subject apply to other states as well as to 
New-York. There never was so auspicious an opportunity, and 
such may never again occur, for the farmers to claim from the le¬ 
gislative bodies of our country, that aid, which the interests of agri¬ 
culture, and of the nation, demand, as the present. They have hi¬ 
therto obtained little or no direct aid, because they have not asked 
for it. If the claim is made promptly, and with spirit and unanimi¬ 
ty, it will not, it cannot be refused. No time should be lost, there¬ 
fore ; and if our brother journalists would prompt their readers on 
the subject, we should hope for the best results. 
It was resolved, in the last State Agricultural Convention, that 
another convention should be held at the Capitol, in Albany, on the 
first Thursday in February next, at 4 oclock P. M. This will af¬ 
ford a favorable opportunity, which we trust will not be lost, of con¬ 
centrating the public feeling upon this subject; and we hope the 
importance of the subject will induce a full meeting on that occa¬ 
sion. 
CORPORATE ASSOCIATIONS. 
We have observed notices of intended applications to the New 
Jersey legislature, and we presume the like will happen in New- 
York and other states, for charters for cultivating the beet, and ma¬ 
nufacturing sugar, with banking and trust powers; for planting mul¬ 
berry trees and fabricating silk, and indeed for almost every purpose 
that comes within the scope of our national industry. 
At no period of our history, and we believe at no period of the 
world, has the mania for stock companies been so rife, and we may 
add so alarming, as at the present day. Hardly a new branch of 
industry can be mentioned, however adapted to individual means 
and enterprize, which is not immediately monopolized by mammoth 
chartered associations. We say monopolized —for when these as¬ 
sociations come in competition with individual effort, the weaker 
party must either be crushed, or become humiliatingly subservient 
to the stronger power. Nor does the disparity exist alone in the 
amount of wealth, and the weight of influence,—the stronger party 
has a further advantage in its chartered privileges, which are not on¬ 
ly withheld from the individual, but which absolutely abstract from 
his natural rights;—as for instance, the individual is amenable to 
the laws for his honest debts, to the extent of his entire means; while 
the chartered associations are not amenable for company debts be¬ 
yond their actual investments, although its members may be worth 
millions. It is a question worthy of high public consideration, whe¬ 
ther a charter should be granted for any object, which an individual, 
or common partnership, are competent and willing to undertake— 
and whether they should be granted in any case, where the public 
good does not indisputably demand them. Mankind are disposed 
to live rather by their wits than by their labor; and when govern¬ 
ment proffers ready facilities for speculation in stocks, without a 
manifest counterbalancing public benefit, it feeds some of the worst 
human passions, and impairs that equality of rights which ever ought 
to be preserved among the citizens of a free state. 
But the multiplication of chartered companies, for trivial or doubt¬ 
ful objects, has an irresistible tendency to unsettle and derange 
the good order of society—to bring honest industry into discredit, 
and to foster a spirit of deceptive desperate speculation, which 
proves the ruin of thousands. Our situation, for the last twenty 
years, has enabled us to observe the movements, and to scan the 
motives, which have led to the rapid multiplication of chartered as- 
