THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN 
263 
Dr. Howard has stated that the opposition to his bill comes only from 
a handful of New York state nurserymen, who are importers, and that 
the bill is favored by the large number of nurserymen of the country. 
That statement is made in print, and he says further that his bill has 
been approved by the National Nurseryman, the trade paper of 
the Nurserymen’s Association, and that certain letters received by 
Mr. Orlando Harrison in 1908 from several hundred nurserymen also 
favored this legislation. 
Mr. Harrison tells me that the letters of inquiry sent out by him at 
that time bore more particularly on the question of a federal law covering 
interstate commerce, and did not have particular reference to foreign 
importations. 
Prof. Craig, editor of the National Nurseryman, tells me that any 
editorials of his appearing in that paper have been simply on the line of 
an approval of any efforts to shut out diseased foreign nursery stock, and 
that The National Nurseryman has not endorsed the Simmons Bill or 
any other particular bill. 
As to the statement that the opposition comes from a small number 
of importing nurserymen, that the main body of the nurserymen are not 
interested in the matter, and do not import nursery stock, I am told by 
six agents of foreign houses that during the last winter they had in this 
country 650 customers who bought French nursery stock, and 889 cus¬ 
tomers who bought Holland nursery stock. A very large majority of 
these customers were direct importers of foreign nursery stock,the goods 
being billed to them, and entries made in their name. 
The statement has also been made by Dr. Howard, that the amount 
involved in this matter was very small, only about $300,000, and that it 
was ridiculous to endanger the country for the sake of a little business 
amounting to $300,000 a' year, and that it would be cheaper for the 
Government to buy up the nurserymen for that price, rather than to 
admit foreign-nursery stock. 
American Imports Large 
The amount involved does not affect the justice of the proposition, 
but nevertheless Custom House records show that the entries at New 
York City alone for the year ending June ist, 1910, were $970,000, and 
it is a conservative estimate that the value of all of the articles covered 
by the Simmons Bill will run not less than $2,000,000 per year. Remem¬ 
ber, this is foreign valuation, to which should be added fifty or sixty per 
cent, to arrive at the value in this country. This shows the value of Dr. 
Howard’s estimates, and places a doubt on some of his other statements. 
Your Committee has been attacked by Dr. Howard for its course in 
this matter, and the statement has been made that while we expressed 
ourselves as favorable to inspection, that we had, by defeating proposed 
legislation, shown that we were opposed to any and all legislation on 
this subject. , 
Lack of Confidence in Bureau Officials 
Your Committee did state in Washington that it was not opposed to 
the principle of inspection, if done on safe, sane, and practical lines, but 
we have felt that the bills proposed placed very large discretionary 
powers in the hands of the Secretary of Agriculture, and that means Dr. 
Howard or somebody under him, and we can say frankly that we are 
opposed to any bill that will place discretionary powers in his hands, for 
from what we have seen of his acts during the past three years, we do not 
feel that it would be safe for the nursery interests of this country to place 
itself unreservedly under his control. His action in 1909, in attempting 
to secure legislation without consulting the nurserymen, and legislation 
that he afterwards acknowledged was impractical, and further his 
promise to consult with us in relation to a bill, which promise he did not 
keep, his action in ordering railroads running out of New York to refuse 
to handle nursery stock, and this action taken without authority, as 
afterwards admitted by him, the action of his friends in adopting the 
Nurserymen’s Bill, and then later on opposing it, and supporting Dr. 
Howard, all show your Committee that in its opinion. Dr. Howard is not 
a safe man in whose hands to place such large discretionary powers, and 
in our opinion any legislation backed by Dr. Howard should be 
opposed by this association. 
While it is true that Dr. Howard at one time offered to eliminate the 
foreign quarantine provision if your Committee would consent to the 
passage of the balance of the bill, we did not feel that it was safe to per¬ 
mit any legislation of this character, believing that if an apparentlv 
harmless bill were enacted, it would be followed later by amendments, 
which would place us in the condition that we have been striving hard to 
escape from. 
W^e all remember the agitation twelve or fifteen years since in regard 
to San Jose Scale. If one-half the trouble then prophesied by the 
experts had come true, there would not today be standing a nursery, an 
orchard, or a forest. They talked destruction from one end of the coun¬ 
try to the other, and filled every one of us with terror or dread. Today 
our friend. Hale, of Georgia and Connecticut, and others, tell us the San 
Jose Scale has been a blessing, for it has forced the orchard man to take 
care of his trees. 
One substantial and tangible result of that agitation is that it has 
provided good jobs at the expense of the federal government and the 
states for a large army of so-called experts, and there is now a long wait¬ 
ing list of applicants for positions in that army which must be taken care 
of. 
One very apparent reason for this present strong agitation is that if 
this bill becomes a law, the Brown Tail will prove as big a boon for the 
experts as was the San Jose Scale. 
At the conference at which the original bill was formulated, there 
were five men present, and two of the five were slated for good positions 
under the law, if enacted. 
When the bill came up in Congress last February, one of the argu¬ 
ments made aga'nst the bill by a member of Congress to whom nothing 
had been said by this Committee, so far as your Chairman is informed, 
was that the bill if enacted meant the employment of a standing army 
of thousands of men to inspect these nursery importations, and that 
instead of involving an appropriation of $25,000 as stated in the testi¬ 
mony of the Chief of the Bureau of Entomology, the Congressman said 
that he was willing to stand by the prophesy that if the bill was enacted, 
the next ten years would see an appropriation amounting up to millions 
of dollars. 
The Congressional Record also contains copy of letter from Secretary 
of Agriculture Wilson, addressed to Mr. Simmons, and favoring the bill, 
and this letter was one of the exhibits filed while the bill was under 
discussion. 
The letter was evidently wrritten by Dr. Howard or Mr. Marlatt, for 
it contains the same statements that have been made by these gentle¬ 
men at other times, and repeats the assertion that the only opposition 
to the bill comes from a small body of importing nurserymen, and that it 
is favored by the agricultural, horticultural, and forestry interests. 
There was also filed at the same time, an exhibit headed “Attitude of 
large producing and other nurserymen toward the proposed planting 
inspection law,’’ and we see that three nurserymen wrote letters favoring 
to some extent Howard’s proposition, but these three nurserymen are all 
heavily engaged in the growing of American Apple Seedlings. 
Another letter quoted comes from our friend, .Col. Watrous, but the 
Colonel forgot to state that the Nurserymen’s Bill was sent to him as 
Chairman of the Committee on Legislation of the American Pomological 
Society, and that after consideration he said that he approved of the bill. 
The same exhibit quotes letters supposed to have been received by 
Mr. Orlando Harrison in 1908, favoring this law, but Mr. Harrison says 
that that correspondence had mainly to do with the question of federal 
control in interstate commerce. 
The statement has been made in connection with the debate in the 
House last February, that most of the talking was done by the friends of 
the nurserymen. We have read over carefully the report of the proceed¬ 
ings, and we find only one member of Congress talking on the subject at 
all, who had been previously interviewed by your Committee, or had 
received any information, from your Committee, so far as we know. 
In the Journal of Economic Entomology, your Committee is also 
attacked for its course. That article also makes the statement that the 
opposition comes from a very small body of importing nurserymen, and 
that the nursery trade generally are not importers, and are in favor of 
this legislation. 
As stated in another place, a few agents of foreign houses report to us 
that they numbered last season 651 customers for French nursery stock, 
and 839 customers for Holland grown stock. That does not indicate 
