280 
THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN 
to regulate commerce between Colorado and Ohio where the 
plaintiff resided and that power is within the exclusive 
province of congress. 
Finally, we hold that all of this act, which requires any 
of your agents in soliciting orders in Wisconsin to take out 
a license or to carry with them duplicate license, is void on 
the ground that congress alone can regulate commerce 
between states and that you and your associates, when 
shipping goods into Wisconsin to fill orders taken by your 
agents in Wisconsin, are engaged in inter-state commerce, 
and the legislature of Wisconsin is without power to place 
conditions upon the manner in which you shall transact 
this inter-state commerce. 
This, of course, does not in any manner deprive the 
State of Wisconsin from the enacting of just and reasonable 
laws under its police power to prevent shipment into the 
state of dangerous or diseased nursery stock, and it is for 
this reason that we say to you that Section 1494-4 requiring 
you to have affixed to the boxes a certificate from a duly 
appointed state or government official at your place of 
residence showing that stock is free from San Jose Scale 
or other injurious insects, or from its diseases, is a reasonable 
regulation, and if you desire to ship nursery stock into 
Wisconsin you will be required to comply with that provi¬ 
sion. 
If there is any other portion of the act about which you 
are in doubt we shall be very glad, indeed, to call specific 
attention to it, but the provisions above referred to are 
the only ones which seem to affect you or your associates 
who are carrying on business in other states than the State 
of Wisconsin. Respectfully submitted, 
McGuire & Wood 
F. W. KELSEY ON PARK COMMISSIONS 
Frederick W. Kelsey, president of the American Nursery 
Company of New York is the author of an article on “The 
Duties of a Park Commission.” The article was written in 
reply to an inquiry as to the duties of such a commission. 
Mr. Kelsey is eminently fitted both by his experience and 
ability to express clear and sensible views, along this line. 
The article appeared in a recent number of the Florist's 
Exchange. 
In substance the paper was as follows: 
There are five considerations that should have the 
attention of a commission starting on its work, namely: 
“(1) Care in organization. 
(2) Selection of competent and reliable assistants. 
(3) The elimination of practical politics from the un¬ 
dertaking. 
(4) Avoiding mistakes from the experience of park 
boards in other cities. 
(5) The treatment of the whole question of parks, 
parkways and playgrounds in a comprehensive way 
for the entire city at the outset, before the piecemeal or 
sectional policy and consequent local jealousies can obtain 
a foothold.” 
The intrusion of practical politics is the bane and the 
millstone about the neck of efficient and economical ad¬ 
ministration everywhere. These undesirable conditions are 
not infrequently injected into the enterprise co-existent 
with the creation of the commission itself. Whatever 
the method of selection or election, it is difficult to en¬ 
tirely eliminate or afterward eradicate this costly and 
baleful influence. 
A not infrequent mistake in new park schemes is 
made at the outset in considering only certain sections, 
without a broader view of the requirements of the city 
or community as a whole. Both as to the appropriation 
of available park funds, as well as to the present and future 
needs of the population, the entire available area should be 
first studied as a whole and the relations of each park and 
parkway location then considered as integral parts of the 
whole. 
Another thing the board may well avoid is the interfer¬ 
ence of speculators and other special interests, who, in 
new park enterprises where public funds are to be ex¬ 
pended, are like the patriot (?)—always for the flag- 
and an appropriation. 
These influences for graft, privilege and plunder, come, 
like spirit knockings, right up under a park board table, 
demanding to be heard and their claims recognized, 
though the source of the noise may be as effectively ob¬ 
scured in the one case as the other. 
Then, too, if the park commission include in their 
plans an avenue or street needed for a parkway, while 
the same route is in use or demanded by a street rail¬ 
way or other utility corporation for its purposes, watch 
out and take the field for the fray; stay in the fight to 
the finish and, if you do your duty, you will surely win; 
although the press bureaus, subservient politicians and 
corporate representatives in authority may, at times, 
make the outlook gloomy and the duties of park com¬ 
missioner at such times seem anything but attrac¬ 
tive.” 
Mr. Kelsey’s experience has been varied and he speaks 
as an authority. His work has clearty demonstrated his 
ability to cope with all situations whether of a horticultural 
or political nature. In his article he draws particular 
attention to the fact that a park commission, while it may 
possess enough knowledge as to the artistic side of its work, 
may lack in executive and administrative qualities. A 
park commission must, in laying plans for any one park or 
improvement, have a complete conception of the future 
lines of development of the park system in the city or 
community. Nurserymen who are called upon to serve as 
park commissioners, cannot do better than seek Mr. 
Kelsey’s aid and advice. 
