THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN 
289 
tion. To those of us who have given any thought along 
lines of a better association it has been apparent all along 
that if anything worth while was accomplished, adequate 
provision must he made for financing the affairs of our 
association. The plan finally recommended by the eom- 
G. Hale Harrison, Albert F. Meehan, 
Berlin, Md. Dresher, Pa. 
They graduated from the nursery in their mothers' care- 
some tune ago and are now helping “dad” to run his. 
mittee and adopted by the asociation by practically the 
unanimous vote of the members present becomes the 
working basis from a monetary point of view. Upon the 
faithful performance of article 7 of your constitution 
rests the success or the failure of all of our plans, and to 
the end that your officers may have the necessary funds 
with which to prosecute the arduous labors committed 
to them, the loyalty and support of every member of the 
association is asked. 
The question is asked, how shall article 7 of the con¬ 
stitution be enforced, and when and how shall additional 
dues be paid. A member doing a business in amount ol 
$10,000.00 to $20,000.00 instead of remitting to the se¬ 
cretary a fee of five dollars would remit ten dollars, and 
a member who is doing an annual business of $100,- 
000.00 or over, will remit to the secretary fifty-five 
rather than five dollars as heretofore. In other words, 
every member will pay additional dues based on the 
volume of business said member does per annum. Every¬ 
one agrees that funds will be needed, in fact, that funds 
have been needed all along, and that because of lack ol 
funds our officers who have served us so efficiently in the 
past have been unable to accomplish the good that they 
could have accomplished had they been supplied with 
necessary funds. Certainly no plan of assessment could 
be fairer than the one adopted by the Detroit convention. 
It is not out of place in connection with discussion of 
the additional dues that have been provided, to sav that 
your executive committee hopes and believes that ii will 
be able at the next meeting ol the association at Milwau¬ 
kee to show splendid results for the additional money col¬ 
lected and expended. For instance, those ol you \\lio 
were present at the Detroit meeting call to mind the re¬ 
port ol the committee on legislation and the urgent need 
brought out by this report for the services of a competent 
attorney whose business it should be to properly safe¬ 
guard the interests of the association and thereby in¬ 
dividual members, in such matter as unfair and unjust 
legislation over the country generally. It will be re¬ 
called that Mr. William Pitkin, Chairman of the Com¬ 
mittee on Legislation, made recommendation that Mr. 
Curtis Y. Smith he retained as general counselor for the 
American Association of Nurserymen, and this matter 
being referred by the association to the executive com¬ 
mittee, the executive committee held a meeting before 
leaving Detroit and instructed and empowered a sub¬ 
committee of the executive committee together with the 
chairman of the Legislative committee to enter into con¬ 
tract with Mr. Smith along lines suggested by the chair¬ 
man of the legislative committee, and every member of 
the association for that matter, has in the employment of 
this splendid firm, competent authority on any question 
of law that effects the nursery interests. To get the best 
results out of this contract we must necessarily use this 
law firm. The results that will accrue to you will after 
all depend upon the individual member using the organ¬ 
ization that your executive committee is endeavoring to 
build. Any member of the executive committee, and for 
the information of every member we are asking our 
trade journals to print in each issue the personnel and 
address of the executive committee, will present to Mr. 
Smith any question that any member desires legislative 
assistance on, or you are at liberty to confer directly 
with Mr. Smith, whose address is Boston, Mass. We 
again say that the use of this new department will re¬ 
sult in great and lasting good to all, if you will only use 
the organization as we are endeavoring to build it. 
Powers of the Executive Committee. It is apparent 
to all who read the constitution and by-laws as printed, 
that great power is delegated to the executive committee. 
Authority in all organization must be vested somewhere, 
and in the minds of the committee who were delegated to 
rewrite this constitution there was no safer place to vest 
authority than in the executive committee. Under the 
constitution and by-laws as provided, the executive com¬ 
mittee is empowered to do all things necessary for the 
good of the association. They are to the association 
what a board of directors are to a well organized cor¬ 
poration, and the faithful and efficient service on the part 
of your executive committee will make of the American 
Association of Nurserymen a thoroughly organized bus¬ 
iness corporation. 
You will note hy referring to article 5 of by-laws the 
suggestion that the committee may if it deems advisable 
gather and compile statistics looking to the stimulation 
of prices and the elimination of surplus products. In all 
probability it will take some years to work out the de¬ 
tails of this plan of gathering statistics, hut your com¬ 
mittee believes that the day will come sooner or later, 
when along this line of endeavor much and lasting good 
can he accomplished for members of the association. It 
is apparent to all who have given the matter thought that 
if there can he adopted some plan to more nearly grow 
the stock that will be taken profitably every year, that 
the nurserymen will have profits rather than losses. 
