The source of this uncorrected OCR text may be viewed in the DjVu format at: http://fax.libs.uga.edu/HD2951xC776/co35 or http://purl.galileo.usg.edu/ugafax/HD2951xC776/co35 CONSUMERS' COOPERATION ORGAN OF THE Consumers' Cooperative Movement in tKe U. S. A. VOLUME XXI - January—December 1935 Published by The Cooperative League of U. S. A. 167 West 12th Street, New York City i/, INDEX CONSUMERS' COOPERATION Ralvaaja Prtat. 2 Fitchburtr, Mass. PAGE Accounting, Cooperative .................................................. 43, 102, 111 Agricultural Missions Foundation .................................................. 177 Alanne, V. S. .................................................................. 12 Allied Cooperatives, Inc. ........................................................ 180 Alton (111.) District Cooperative Association ....................................... 211 "America Must Choose" ......................................................... 204 "America's Answer" ............................................................. 72 "America's Capacity to Produce" ................................................ 2 Architecture, Swedish Cooperative Wholesale Society's .......................... 147, 168 Arnold, Mary E. ................................................................ 104 Augustus, E. K. ................................................................ 98 Austria, Cooperation in ......................................................... 211 B Babson, Roger .................................................................. 204 Baker, Jacob ................................................................... 66 Banking ...................................................................... 53, 55 Barclay, Wade Crawford ........................................................ 212 Beard, Charles A. .............................................................. 137 Becker, Carl .................................................................... 123 Belgium, Cooperation in ......................................................... 85 Bowen, E. R. ....................................................... 72, 159, 172, 198 Brody, C. L. ................................................................... 29 Burial Cooperatives ............................................................. 133 Buying Clubs ............................................................... 40, 174 C Cafeterias, Cooperative ...................................................... 69, 170 Calendar, Cooperative League .................................................... 101 California Cooperative Council .......................................... 117, 150, 165 California, Cooperation in ....................................................... 46 Campbell, Wallace J. ....................................................... 132, 198 Canada, Cooperation in .......................................................... 171 Canadian Price Spread Investigation .............................................. 165 Capitalism and Cooperation Compared ... ....................................... 124 Carlson, Edward ............................................................... 11 Catholic Rural Life Conference ........................................ s.......... 214 Central Cooperative Wholesale ............ 4, 70, 99, 102, 109, 151, 165, 166, 196, 197, 213 Central States Cooperative League .................................... 116, 150, 182, 212 Chain Stores and Cooperation ................................................ 45, 213 Chase, Stuart ................................... ............................... 209 Cherington, Paul T. ................. i...!.!....!!...'.'.'!.....'.'................... 106 China, Cooperation in ........................................................... 177 "Christ's Alternative to Communism." E. Stanley Jones .............................. 183 Church and Cooperation ........ 50, 70, 97, 101, 104, 125, 127, 130, 136, 142, 153, 155. 167, 177, 180, 184, 185, 186, 192, 197, 202, 214 City Consumers' Cooperatives ............. ..... .... ......................... 84 Cloquet (Minn.) Cooperative Society ..................................... 46, 102, 198 Clusa Service .............. ....... 38 Coady, M. M. ...............................................................] 16 ^Collective Bargaining for Consumers" ............................................ 199 College Cooperatives ......................................... 87, 88, 104, 132, 166, 171 Colombia, Cooperation in ........................................................ 100 Colorado Cooperative Educational Association ...................................... 212 Columbus Consumers' Cooperative ....... . . ......... 180 Conroy, Thomas F. 1Q4 Consumers' Advisory Board INDEX PAGE ____„ .._.„_., ___ ...................................................... 198 Consumers' Cooperative Association, INorth Kansas City 46, 71, 85, 99, 103, 167, 179, 195, 2fl Consumers' Cooperative Services, New York City ....................... 46, 99, 134, 170 Consumers' Cooperative Services, Chicago ......................................... 165 Consumers' Cooperative Trading Company, Gary, Indiana ........................... 173 Consumers' Cooperatives Associated, Inc., Amarillo, Texas ........................... 199 Cooley, Oscar .............................................................. 128, 150 "Cooperation," by Hall and Watkins ............................................. 92 "Cooperative Democracy" ................................................... 133, 180 Cooperative Distributors .............................. 22, 42, 71, 118, 134, 199, 212, 213 Cooperative Economic Democracy ................................................ 72 Cooperative Insurance Society, England ........................................... 37 Cooperative Trading Company, Waukegan, Illinois ...................... 33, 117, 179, 188 Cooperative Wholesale Association of Southern California ........................... 196 Cooperators Life Association ................................................... 37, 87 Cowden, Howard A. ..................................................... 28, 114, 128 Cowling, Ellis J. .................................................... 47, 104, 168, 192 Credit ................................................................... 27, 56, 98 Credit Corporation, Agricultural .................................................. 83 Credit Unions .............................................. 53, 55, 57, 70, 84, 86, 175 Crews, Cecil R. ................................................................ 198 Current Literature on Consumers' Cooperation............ 22, 47, 72, 88, 104, 120, 136, 152, 167, 184, 200, 216 Czechoslovakia, Cooperation in ........................................... 85, 202, 210 D Denmark, Cooperation in .................................................... 137, 203 Design Service, Cooperative ............................................... 78, 79, 147 Directors' Meeting .............................................................. 92 "Doctor and The Public, The" ................................................... 199 Douglas, Paul H. ............................................................ 47, 105 Eastern Cooperative Wholesale .................................................. 195 Eastern Cooperators Study Tour .................................................. 117 Eastern States Cooperative League .................................... 45, 96, 126, 182 Eastern States Farmers Exchange ........................ 4, 70, 99, 118, 133, 151, 161, 195 Economic Democracy, A General Plan for an American Cooperative .................. 172 Editorials .............................. 2, 25, 49, 73, 90, 105, 121, 137, 153, 169, 185. 201 Education in Cooperation ............. 77, 84, 86, 96, 101, 103, 111, 117, 119, 123, 134, 169, 175, 176, 179, 188, 193, 195, 204 Edwards, Ellen ................................................................. 48 Edwards, Wyndham I. .......................................................... 178 Electrification, Cooperation in ............................................ 82, 140, 169 Enfield, Honora ................................................................ 179 Employee Education ............................................................ 12 Employment, Statistics Here and in Great Britain ................................... 214 Ethiopia ....................................................................... 188 Europe, Cooperation in ................................................. 69, 85, 93, 106 Europe, Social Effects of Cooperation in ......................................... 205 Evanston (111.) Consumers' Cooperative ........................................... 212 Farm Bureau Mutual Automobile Insurance Company .................... 21, 39, 151, Farm Bureau Services, Michigan .....................-••-••••••••••••••••••••••••• Farm Credit ....................................•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• Farm Supplies, Cooperative Purchasing of ...................-•••••••••••••••••• '"• Farm Tenancy .................................•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• Farmer-Bankers Take Over Rural Finance ................-••••••••••••••••••••••• Farmers Become Cooperative Consumers ...........-••••••-•••••••••••••••••••••••• Farmers' Consumer Cooperation ..............•.••-••••••••••••••••••••••••••• y'_' Farmers' Cooperative Buying .....................••••••••••••••••• " • • • • ~::j i—' Farmers Union Central Exchange .....................•--••-••••• 4' 45- 99, 11/. 133, Fascism .............,...........,...........-•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• y_y Federal Council of Churches .,.,,............-••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• ' 166 29 58 215 203 98 113 189 213 197 202 205 INDEX PAGE Federal Emergency Relief Administration ....................... 21, 45, 103, 159, 171, 196 pilene, Edward A. .............................................................. 50 Financial Control ............................................................... 36 Finland, Cooperation m .......................................................... 185 Flvnn, John T. ................................................................. 186 Folk Schools ..................................................... 10,21,74,202 Fowler, Bertram B. ........................................................... 47, 170 Frank, Glenn .................................................................. 123 Franklin Cooperative Creamery Association ................................ 32, 118, 165 Gandhi's Policy ................................................................. 154 Geer, Owen M. ................................................................. 183 Germany, Cooperation in ........................................................ 210 Gilbert, Joseph ................................................................. 26 Gill, C. O. ..................................................................... 205 Goss, Albert S. ................................................................. 58 Government and Cooperation ........................................ 148, 171, 187, 201 "Government in Business" ....................................................... 209 Graham, Abbie ................................................................. 153 Graham. Chester ................................................................ 74 Grange Cooperative Wholesale .......................................... 101, 135, 198 Great Britain, Cooperation in.... 37, 39, 69, 85, 93, 100, 135, 154, 170, 171, 177, 178, 186, 187 Greater Boston Cooperative Society ............................................... 198 Greenleaf, Esther ............................................................... 79 Grenfeld, Wilfred ............................................................... 155 H Halonen, George ............................................................... 12 Hayes, A. J. .................................................................... 13 Health Protection, Cooperative ................................................... 199 Herren, L. S. ................................................................... 189 Holmes, John Haynes ................................................... 26, 170, 187 Holt, Arthur E. ................................................................. 90 Hosie, Laurence T. .......................................................... 97, 127 Hull, I. H. ..................................................................... 93 Hunter, James Boone ......."...................................................... 47 Hutchinson, Carl R. ........................................................... 7, 157 Hyde, William A. ....................................................... 38, 73, 200 I Iceland, Cooperation in .......................................................... 177 Illinois Agricultural Association ................................................... 36 Incentives in Cooperation and in Business ....................................... 106. 203 Indiana Farm Bureau Cooperative Association ........................ 5, 99, 102, 127, 195 Institutes ....................................................... 13, 21, 171, 182, 212 Insurance .................................. 20, 35, 36, 71, 83, 87, 150, 151, 166, 196, 202 International Cooperative Alliance and Peace ....................................... 210 International Cooperative School, 14th ............................................ 176 International Cooperative Women's Day ........................................... 86 International Wholesaling ........................................ 103, 114, 122, 135, 212 Italy, Cooperation in ............................................................ 211 "Introduction to Consumers' Cooperation, A Short" ................................ 104 J Jacobson, George W. .......................................................... 9, 46 Japan, Cooperation in ...'.'. ". '. ". ". ". ". ". ". ". '. ' '. ". '. ' '. '. '. ' ' '. ". ". '. ". ' '. '. '. '. '. '. '. '. '. '. '. '. ' '. '. ' 18, 100, 178, *194 Jessup, John ........... 96 Johansson, Albert ...... " •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 7Q Johnson, General Hugh .........................................'.'.'.'..'...'.'.' ',',',' 76, 187 Journalism, Cooperative 13 Jones, E. Stanley ....................................................... 126, 138, 183 INDEX K PAGE PACT? rnnnpratinn in Tanan 1R in« 11Q 176 1 S4 170 iS Ohio Farm Bureau Federation. .... 15, 35, 83, 102, 117, 133, 179, 180, 188, 195, 196, 204, 211 M ........................ 18, 108, 1 19, 126, 154^ 170, 97 ^OCooperat^es . . 27, 45, 69, 81, 86, 90, 103, 106, 1 17, 1 18, 122, 151, 179, 180, 199, 211, 212 : ! !! : ! " !! ^ ! : !! ! : : : !! !! " !! :: :: !! " " !! :: !! : "i! ! : ! ! . .'. . . : . . .' 7\ ou Age Security ............................................................... 39 King, Starr ..................................................................... 27 Oison, Floyd B. ................................................................ 69 Knapp, Joseph G. and John H. Lister .............................................. 215 H. G. Labor and Consumers' Cooperation ....................... 101, 104, 127, 137, 146, 170, 199 Labor, Consumers' Conference on ................................................. 87 Laidler, Harry W. .............................................................. 136 Lane, Harry L. Larson, R. R. .. La Sille C H 161 30 "Î7 ? l Lever, E. J. .......................................... ........................ 42, 88 Libraries, Cooperative ........................................................... 102 Libraries, Traveling ............................................................. 118 Lincoln, Murray D. .............................................. 35, 90, 121, 127, 138 Lindenberger, J. H. .............................................................. 49 Liukku, J. ................................................................... 33, 105 Long, Huey .................................................................... 73 M Marketing Cooperatives ......................................................... 82 Massachusetts, Cooperative Education in ........................................... 207 Massachusetts League of Cooperative Clubs ....................................... 213 May, Henry J. ................................................................. 210 Medicine, Cooperative ............................................... 81, 102, 170, 199 " " ~- . . . ................................... 9, 11 ................................................. 125, 215 ... ........................................ 29 Midland Cooperative Wholesale ........................... 21, 86, 99, 118, 152, 195, 214 Milk, Cooperative Distribution of .................... 30, 51, 85, 86, 90, 121, 137, 166, 203 Mitchell, John T. W. ............................................................ 155 Monopolies and Consumers' Cooperation ........................................... 148 __*_.__ * j 1 rjr* * lf\ Moore, James R. ......................................................... 14, 73, HO Morgan, Arthur E. .............................................................. 107 Motion Pictures of Cooperatives ................................................. 88 rs, Joseph ................................................................. 195 N "National Being, The" ........................................................... 88 National Cooperatives, Inc. .................................................. 74, 103 National Recovery Administration ....................................... 49, 63, 76, 139 Nebraska Farmers Union State Exchange ................................. 4, 74, 99, 189 Negro Finds a Way to Economic Equality ......................................... 173 New Day Cooperative, Oakland, California ....................................... 165 New Deal ................................................................... 52, 61 News Service, The Cooperative League ....................................... 118, 213 Niemela, Waldemar ..................................... ..................... 31, 88 Noble County (Indiana) Cooperative Association ................................... 158 Pacific Northwest, Cooperation in ................................................ 46 Pacific Supply Cooperative ...................................................... 133 Page, Kirby .................................................................... 106 Palmer, C. C. .................................................................. 7 Parker, Florence E. ............................................................. 23 Parodneck, Meyer .............................................................. 103 Petersen, V. S. ................................................................. 37 Patriotism ...................................................................... 26 Peace and the International Cooperative Alliance ................................... 210 Peace, Economic and Political ........................... ........................ 201 —— " r ..................................................... 22 Cooperative Association .......................... 75, 195, 211 Must We Develop a ..................................... 77 Consumers' Cooperative Club ........................................ 150 ), Arthur .............................................................. 100, 122 Roneers ....................................................................... 1 Plan of Cooperative Action ...................................................... 3 Plan for an American Cooperative Economic Democracy ............................ 172 Platt, Warren C. ............................................................... 22 Press Boosts Cooperation .............. 22, 47, 72, 88, 104, 120, 136, 152, 167, 184, 200, 216 Press Circulation, Cooperative .................................................... 135 "Producer-Consumer, The" ...................................................... 166 Production, Cooperative ...................................................... 69, 111 Profits ................................................................. 12, 122, 154 Promotion and Education in America, How Shall We Finance ........................ 76 Public Utilities and Cooperation .................................................. 186 R Reddix, J. L. ................................................................... 173 Radio Broadcasting ...................................................... 15, 101, 133 Range Cooperative Federation .................................................... 69 Ratzlaff, C. J. .................................................................. 48 Recovery and Consumers' Cooperation ............................................. 171 Recreation, Cooperative ............................................ 7, 71, 86, 157, 188 Regli, W. E. ................................................................... 43 Resolutions .................................................................... 50 Restaurants, Cooperative ...................................................... 99, 134 Retail Trade, Who Owns ........................................................ 107 Reynolds, Quentin .............................................................. 61 Richberg, Donald .................................................... . ...... . 2 Ricker, A. W. ........................................................'..'. 75, 84, 105 Rochdale Centennial ............................................................ 178 Rochdale Cooperation, Ninetieth Year of .......................................... 4 Roosevelt, President Franklin D. .................................................. 169 Roosevelt, Theodore ............................................................ 138 Russia, Cooperation in ................................. ............. '" ... 211 Russell, George W. (AE) ...................................... ... 88, 159, 170 16, 74, n William F Sankari, H. O .......................................................... l// ''''^^^ 1 INDEX I I "Self-help for the Unemployed" ............................................ Shadid, Dr. Michael ....................................................... "Skin Deep," a review ..................................................... Smith, Robert L. .......................................................... Social Security ........................................................... "Socializing our Democracy," a review ............................................ 13( South Takes to Consumers' Cooperation ........................................... 14) "Spider Web, The" ............................................................. Ifij Spider Web of Wall Street, The ................................................. % Stanford, Senator Leland ...................................................... 73, f] Starr, Mark ................................................................. 101, 127 Statistics .......................................... 45, 112, 138, 154, 171, 187, 213, 21« Steinhauser, Joseph ............................................................. 4J Stevens, Harry ................................................................. l; Stolpe, Herman ................................................................. 19] Stores, Consumers' Cooperative Retail ............................................. 3i Student Christian Movement ..................................................... 18( Sweden. Cooperation in .................. 70, 85, 105, 121, 122, 139, 144, 171, 186, 193, 20f Sweden, Land of Economic Democracy ........................................... 14; Swedish Munitions Control ...................................................... 7j Taxes ........................................................ 105. 153, 186, 202, 212 Taylor, Alva W. ............................................................... 186 Taylor, Lewis .................................................................. 25 Technique of Democracy ........................................................ 9i Ten Year Plan, Great Britain .................................................... 178 Tennessee Valley Authority .......................................... 81, 88, 134, 141 Tennessee Valley Authority Cooperative .......................................... 133 Thompson, Carl ................................................................ 137 Toad Lane Store ............................................................... 17C Tomlinson. C. E. ............................................................ 169, ITS Tompkins, J. J. .......................................................... 49, 95. 203 Topping, Helen ...................................................... 18, 68, 119, 12! Tour, European ........................................ 46, 93, 103, 119, 122, 128, 16f Trade Unions .................................................................. 2i Tugwell, Rexford Guy ...................................................... 154, 20: Twenty Years in the Wilderness ............. .................................... 12'. U Union Oil Company of Boise Valley .............................................. ¥. United Cooperative Society of Maynard, Mass. ......................... 35, 133, 166, 19! United Workers League of Upper Michigan ........................................ 16i Utilities, Cooperative .......................................................... 83, 8i W Wallace, Henry A. ............................................................. 21 War and Profits .................................. 91, 100. 106, 137, 139, 155, 187, 20! Warbasse, J. P. ....................................... 4, 63, 81, 113, 141, 180, 199, 20! Warinner, A. W. ........................................................... 40, llf Watkins, W. P. ................................................................ W "What Consumers' Cooperation Means to a Minister" ............................... 192 Whitewater, (Wisconsin) Consumers' Cooperative Association ....................... 19! Winchester, Harold P. ................ "......................................... 5i Wisconsin Law and Consumers' Cooperation .............................. 169, 181, 21: Women's Guilds ....................................................... 150, 196, 19! Woods, G. S. .................................................................. I« Workmen's Mutual Fire Insurance Society .................................. 86, 118, 15 Wright, Frank Lloyd ........................................................... IS "Young Man, What Now?" ..................................................... I3; Youth Educational Programs .................................................... 5, J Youth Leagues ................................................................ 8, «. Youth and Cooperation ..................................................... 169, 1» "CONSUMERS COOPERATION A National Magazine for Cooperative Leaders Organ of the Consumers' Cooperative Purchasing Movement in the U. S. à & Eternal as the Unending Circle Harcly as the Evergreen Pine Vol. XXI. No. 1 JANUARY, 1935 10 cents ALL HONOR TO AMERICAN AND ROCHDALE PIONEERS December 21st, 1934, marked the passing of the ninetieth year of Con sumers' Cooperation. America justly celebrates the founding of our republic by American Pi oneers in 1776. The Fathers of this republic founded 159 years ago on this continent a union of the people committed to the principles of political, educa tional and religious democracy. They set up forms of organizations to carry out the principles of democracy in these three fields, which have proven to be basic, necessitating only .such amendments as 'time already has or will teach, us are required to more fully realize these principles. The economic conditions of that time were such that there was then a large measure of justice in the dis tribution of the ownership of wealth. Accordingly, our American Pioneers did not incorporate in the forms of economic organization they set up such prin ciples as would have prevented the concentration of the ownership of wealth in the hands of a few and its even wider distr;bution among the people as a whole. v Sixty-eight years later in 1844, or 90 years ago, the Rochdale Pioneers found themselves in the midst of conditions of economic distress such as America is only now experiencing and, having become disillusioned over the possibilities of securing economic justice by political action, they formulated ~ ' adopted the form of organization called Consumers<^Cooperation which incorporates the principles of economic democracy. \. To the Rochdale Pioneers of economic democracy, as well as to the Ameri can Pioneers of political, educational and religious democracy, we, their de scendants of this generation, pay humble homage and pledge to them and to the generations to follow, our utmost efforts of heart, mind, and body to complete the great work they began by building Communities Beautiful on this earth where the greatest expansion of the individual personalities of every human being will be possible. —— 7660J f LIBRARY CONSUMERS COUPERATION Jan. 1935 Tan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION CONSUMERS COOPERATION An organ to spread the knowledge of the Cooperative Movement, whereby the people, in voluntary association, purchase and produce for their own use the things they need. Published monthly by The Cooperative League of the U. S. A., 167 West 12th St., New York City. E. R. Bowen, Editor Contributing Editors V. S. Alanne George Jacobson George Halonen James R. Moore A. W. Warinner Entered as Second Class matter, December 19, 1917, at the Post Office at New York, N. Y., un der the Act of March 3, 1879. Price $1.00 a year. Vol. XXI. No. 1 Jan. 1935 Our New Name The name of the first issue of this magazine was The Cooperative Con sumer and was dated May, 1914. In the issue of January, 1919, the name was changed to Cooperation. Now at the close of 21 years of educating America to the principles adopted by the Roch dale Cooperative Pioneers, we are again adding the word Consumer and shall henceforth use the name Con sumers' Cooperation. There are two reasons for this change: first, to indicate more definite ly the purpose of The Cooperative League and avoid confusion with other forms of Cooperation as well as with the many general uses of the word Co operation; and secondly, to take ad vantage of the rapidly growing realiza tion by the people that we are first of all Consumers and must organize our selves as such in a day of plenty. A Sign of Political Disillusionment Donald Richberg says truthfully, "Our experiment with industrial self- government demonstrated all too clear ly that private business is not yet ade quately organized for collective action and self-discipline, and that political controls are a poor substitute for volun tary cooperation." America's Capacity to Produce and Inability to Consume The National Survey of Potential Product Capacity reports that "the American people in the last five year period have permitted themselves to be deprived of goods and services to the amount of 287 billions of 1929 dollars, or an average of 57 billions per year." This additional amount could have been produced "if physical factors and knowledge had been the only limitation on production." This lack of production, when we had the physical capacity and knowl edge to produce 692 billions of wealth rather than 405 billions, or a shortage of 287 billions, was the result of "un even distribution of buying power, The goods and services listed in our budget could not be consumed unless everyone helped in their consumption. They are not like dollars of which one man can possess a million and another none at all. This consumption of budgeted goods and services would require the cooperation of the entire population." We have concentrated "Purchasing Power" in the hands of a few. But "Consuming Ability" cannot be con centrated to the same degree. The few cannot consume the food and goods represented by the purchasing power they receive in the form of money in come. This holding of excess monetary power to consume by the few is what prevents additional production. Things that are produced must be consumed or we pile up what are miscalled sur pluses. They are not surpluses beyond the needs of the mass of the people but beyond the consuming ability of the few who hold the monetary counters controlling their distribution. The Jcey question is the distribution of purchasing power to match the dis tribution of consuming ability. Starting a cooperative and shunting the profits back into the hands of the people as a whole through patronage dividends in stead of concentrating the profits into the hands of the few through stock dividends is the way .to distribute pur chasing power to match consuming ability. What New Worlds have You Planned to Conquer for Cooperation in 1935? This question is addressed to The Cooperative League, District Leagues, Wholesale Cooperatives, Retail Coop erative Associations and Individual Cooperators. As to The Cooperative League the accomplishments of the year of 1934 could perhaps be summed up in two re sults: first, the Coming of Age of The League as a result of including in its membership a number of Wholesales and their affiliated retail Cooperatives which now make The League truly representative of the whole Con sumers' Cooperative Purchasing Move ment in the United States, and the celebration of this significant develop ment at the Ninth Biennial Congress; second, the enlisting of the aggressive support of the Movement by progres sive leaders of Church, School, and Political Organizations of Society. The General Plan of Action of The Cooperative League sets up as the prin cipal definite objectives of The League for 1935 the following additional ac complishments: first, the greater co- ordination of the various types of co operative activities, namely, Supply, Service, Insurance, Banking, Auditing ?nd Education; second, the enlisting of the activity of Farm, Professional and particularly Labor leaders in the prac tical organization of Consumers' Co operative Associations. At least one of the District Leagues has in the process of formation a far more concrete program of action than before, both in the way of Cooperative education and practical organization. Four Wholesale Cooperatives have completed or announced new building plans of significant size. Cooperatives have not only proven to be Noah's Arks in surviving the deluge of the de pression but their business and savings have grown so as to demand enlarged facilities after five years of collapse of the capitalistic system. Three new Co operative Insurance Associations will be actively functioning in 1935. Retail Cooperatives are so many in number that their plans cannot be dis cussed in detail. They plan to grow in volume of business, in 'kinds of services to their members and in numbers in 1935. It is equally important that each In dividual Cooperator and particularly Cooperative Leaders, likewise plan definitely at the beginning of another year to increase the spirit of Coopera tion in their souls, the facts of Cooper ation in their minds, and their own ef forts in organizing new Cooperatives and adding new services to Coopera tives already organized. We must all make every year count towards the realization of a Coopera tive Economic Democracy. There are only ten years more ahead of us to the centennial of the Consumers' Coopera tive Movement when we must be far nearer our goal. Found in America: A Great Philo sophical Cooperative Educator America has found a great philo sophical cooperative educator in the person of Dr. Horace M. Kallen, Pro fessor of Philosophy at the New School for Social Research, New York City. A large number have read and com mented on his series of articles in the Christian Century. In a recent address at the Judson Memorial Church in New York his talk glistened with jewel-like expressions. Some of them were: "A surplus is that which the masters cannot use—there are no surpluses in human terms—only insufficiencies." "A heaven is sheer consumption." "Through Consumers' Cooperation you can get self-fulfillment immediate- iy.;; "Consumers' Cooperation has been the basic stabilizer of Great Britain." "Consumers' Cooperation and war are the only alternatives for the dis posal of our so-called surpluses." "The right to live is a prior right to the right to work." "Others may stake their faith on Communism; I stake mine on Con* sumers' Cooperation," CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan. 1935 Tan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION American Cooperatives Celebrate Ninety Years of Cooperation by Expanding Cooperative Youth Education Condensed from an address to the Cooperative League Congress Anthony Lehner, Educational Director Indiana Farm Bureau Cooperative Association AS a fitting tribute ,to ninety years of Rochdale Cooperation, the American Movement, usually consid ered by European Cooperators as the baby of the family, celebrated by an nouncing an expansion of present equipment to include the purchase of a new warehouse, the construction of two new buildings to house the central offices and oil compounding plants of two other Cooperative wholesales and the completion of a $300,000 addition to a cooperative feed mill. This will make possible even greater economies in service by eliminating rent, interest and profits which were previously paid pri vate owners. Central Cooperative Wholesale, Su perior, Wisconsin, has already moved into its new home, a modern, four story steel, brick and concrete structure hav ing a floor space of 122,000 square feet. The building will serve as warehouse and central office and is equipped to handle efficiently the $160.000 monthly business of. the 125 retail cooperative stores affiliated., with the Central Co operative Wholesale. The larger quar ters will enable the wholesale to add several new services it has planned for some time. The new home of the Farmers' Union Central Exchange in St. Paul, which has been financed and authorized and will soon, be under construction will embody the latest developments in modern architecture. The building will be three stories high with ground di mensions 130 by 60 feet. Administra tive offices of the cooperative and of the Farmers' Union Herald will occupy the entire top floor. Machinery for the oil compounding plant, which will oc cupy the remainder of the building, in cludes three blending' tanks and vat storage for 215,000 gallons of basic stock and 70,000 gallons of finished products. An up-to-date blending pro cess and the finest available Pennsyl vania oils will be used. The organiza tion sold to its members more than a million gallons of lubricating oil last year. The plant provides for expansion to three times the present annual vol ume. The Nebraska Farmers' Union is now constructing in Omaha a modern building to house the Farmers' Union State Exchange, the Union State head quarters, editorial offices of the Neb raska Union Farmer and The Nebras ka Farmers' Union Mutual Insurance Company. The structure is 66 by 100 feet and represents a total investment of $150,000. The building is being erected entirely without the help of outside capital. The Eastern States Farmers' Ex change has completed a $300,000 addi tion to its feed mill in Buffalo. This is an outstanding example of the evolu tion from consumer purchasing into the field of production for use when de mand becomes sufficient to warrant it. The addition to the mill has been paid for out of reserve surplus savings of the cooperative. These four new structures stand as silent testimony to the growth of co operative enterprises in the face of economic distress while competitive businesses have been forced to retrench or fail. When Light Lengthened The birth of Cooperation on the 21st of December, 1844, in the little shop in Rochdale, is symbolic. That was the hour of the Winter Solstice, celebrated by the peoples of the East for ten thou sand years. On that day in December, the dreaded night ceased to grow longer and light conquered the dark ness.—Dr. J. P. Warbasse, President, The Cooperative League. IN the last few years the Indiana Farm Bureau Coop. Association has had a steady growth but it became more and more apparent that in order to car ry on successfully it was necessary to establish a definite educational pro gram into which should be brought the younger element of rural Indiana, which tomorrow must assume the lead ership of the organization. As it was not possible to secure as yet this edu cation and this type of training in the public school system of the state, the Indiana Farm Bureau Cooperative As sociation established a one, week's course of training and selected two places in the state to carry on this work. The complete responsibility for these schools was placed in the hands of the state organization, which in turn asked each county to .send a student or two to these schools and to finance the ex penses of the training. The total cost including board and room and tuition was set at $12.00 per student per week. We had a total enrollment of 163 stu dents, 38 young people from Noble County alone were included in this group. Students Build Local Schools The one requirement we made of these students was that they should go back into their respective counties and assume the responsibility of establish ing study clubs for the express purpose of giving at least one evening a month over to the study of the cooperative movement as nresented in these train ing schools. Most of them did a splen did piece of work and secured groups varying from 15 to 25 people in their home counties to meet once a month for the purpose of studying a particular phase of the cooperative movement. Stores—Agriculture—Trust Busting 1 he state organization submitted, in a mimeographed form, material for these county meetings, which were pre ceded each month by a district meet ing of the leaders from the various counties. The general outline for these study courses opened with the study of the cooperative movement in In dustrial England. The Rochdale prin ciples were held before the group at all times and were given fullest anal ysis. Then we moved over to Denmark where the cooperative development was built around the needs of an agri cultural population, which fitted itself to the highest degree into the Indiana background. The next discussion dealt with the developments in the other Scandinavian countries, primarily Swe den. Here big trusts and cartels, were effectively met by consumer coopera tives. From Sweden we moved across into Germany to study the develop ment of the Credit Union. The next discussion dealt with the general needs of cooperative education and the last month was given over to a discus sion of the development in Indiana. After the conclusion of our winter program we tried to develop ways and means to make these summer schools accessible to a larger number of peo ple. We shifted part of the responsi bility to the counties by suggesting to them that we would Bring the school into their county provided that they would furnish the location and food and shelter. In most instances we were agreeably surprised that within the confines of a large number of counties splendid facilities were available for the type of work we wanted. Twenty-Three Local Summer Schools The proposition we made to our various county units was that if they would furnish the facilities we would furnish the instructors, a service for which there would be no charges made. In most instances the counties were CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan. 1935 Tan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION able to make some very advantageous arrangements to secure camp sites with food and sleeping quarters furnished at very reasonable rates. This enabled u:; to secure a much larger group of young people from the various counties and we were agreeably surprised when finally applications were made from about 43 counties for a week's training school. A new problem arose. We had only a limited number of weeks in which to carry on our work. This meant that we had to consolidate several counties, and develop two staffs of instructors to run two camps concurrently. Begin ning on June 3 and running up to Sep tember 15th we had to crowd twenty- three weeks' work into fourteen weeks. This meant that the program had to be arranged so that at least part of the instructors could present the same dis cussion in both camps. Cooperative Economics—Cooperative Philosophy—Cooperative Play The camp opened on Sunday after noon with an address of welcome and a lecture on "Why Cooperate." Every evening at nine o'clock the camp fire session was held, which was very largely taken up in the playing of folk games and folk dances rather than competitive games. Beginning Monday five lectures and discussions were of fered each day dealing with a wide variety of subjects. Organization and Administration of Cooperatives based on the Rochdale Structure was given one and one half hours discussion each day. Producers and Consumers' Coop eratives, Their Place in the Economic Scheme, aroused the interest of the stu dents. Other topics discussed were: Cooperative Marketing, Wfty Cooper ative Education, Why Buy Coopera tive Goods, The Economic Depression, Its Causes and Remedy, Aids for Agri culture in its Present Crisis, Credit Unions and Their Place in the Cooper ative Movement, Cooperative Banking, The Woman's Place in the Coopera tive Movement, and as a final sum mary, Cooperation—a Philosophy of Life. Every evening the meetings were thrown open to the parents and friends of the young people and aside from the regularly enrolled students, approxi mately 700, we reached in excess of 4,000 people with a discussion on one phase or the other of the cooperative movement. Before each group left on Saturday, in every instance, where we had a suf ficient number of people from any one county, the students perfected the or ganization of a study club in their respective counties to go ahead this winter in the development of the pro gram. At the beginning of each week the group was organized for the duration of the school and took charge of the program, as far as presiding at the various meetings, the introduction of speakers, presentation of motions and so forth were concerned. They learned what Robert's Rules of Order mean and not only how to work together but how to play together, a thing which we have almost forgotten. Education for Economic Democracy These students of today, the leaders of tomorrow, have a broader concep tion of this whole cooperative move ment, its fundamentals and its philos ophy than some of us older ones were privileged to have. It is safe to say that if we are permitted to continue this program for the next five or ten years, that the purchase refund or the patron age earning will no longer be the driv ing motive in the development of the cooperative movement, which, we are afraid, has been very largely the foun dation upon which we built, but we will have developed in the minds of those young people a new and finer and higher conception of cooperation, no longer a mere word, as it is for many of us, but the basis for a new social and economic order for which the world is yearning today. A County Cooperative Youth Educational Program Condensed from an address to the Cooperative League Congress C. C. Palmer, President, Noble County Farm Bureau IN the February issue of the Review of International Cooperation, the official organ of the International Co operative Alliance, were listed the seven fundamental principles of coop eration; and the last of these was the promotion of education. It occurs to me that instead of listing cooperative edu cation last, it might well be placed first, or still more logically it should precede the organization of a cooperative. During the winter of 1932-1933 some forty directors, employees, and other leaders and their wives in Noble Coun ty held monthly meetings studying the history, growth and principles of the cooperative movement. As a result of this crude educational program, our di rectors developed a vision of the need of youth education. In the summer of 1933 our state cooperative association held five cooperative schools, of a week's duration. Our directors saw an opportunity to extend these schools another week and sponsor one for our own group. As a result thirty-eight young folks were enrolled, the repre sentation was approximately three from each township. The total expense was paid by our cooperative associa tion. Those enrolling agreed to organ ize in each of their respective town ships a cooperative study club among the young folks. A Little Lump Leaveneth the Whole Loaf Eleven of the twelve townships held monthly meetings with an average total attendance of nearly four hundred young folks. These groups discussed cooperation an hour and played an hour. The results were so satisfactory that our cooperative financed another cooperative school the past summer, with a new group enrolled from each township to teach the history, magni tude, growth, and fundamentals of co- ooeration. Our County Superintendent of Schools, five high school teachers and thirteen grade school teachers joined the students in these two summer schools. In all of their college training, not one of these teachers had found a page on cooperation in their text books on economics or social service and many of them voluntarily expressed their gratitude for the opportunity to learn of this new social and economic order. Several of the teachers remarked that this week's training was more val uable to them than any eight weeks' term they had attended at a teachers' college. In two of the consolidated schools, the teachers have formed school supply cooperatives, with student directors and officers. What better way is there to learn something than by doing it? These township study clubs are being conducted this year with even greater enthusiasm and interest than last year due to the additional talent in each communty trained in this year's summer school. Special credit must be given to Mr. Carl R. Hutchinson for merly of the Chicago Theological Sem inary who has moved to Noble County and spends part of his time working with these groups of young folks in an educational and recreational pro gram. Mr. Hutchinson secured the services of Lynn Rohrbaugh .and held a recreational training school in the county the last four days and nicjhts of the past week, which was attended by a hundred and seventy-five young folks from every part of the county. These people can now help with recreation in their own community clubs, Groundwork for a New Order Our cooperative has been appro- 8 CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan. 1935 Tan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION priating approximately fifteen per cent of its net savings for promotion of co operative education. If we continue our summer schools for four or five years, and have fifteen or twenty of these trained young folks in each township and retain the assist ance of Mr. Hutchinson for part of this time, I have a vision that within fifteen or twenty years this group of social minded, inspired, intelligent, unselfish, and idealistic young people will build a little cooperative democracy in Noble County. Organized Youth Educates Youth Condensed from an address to the Cooperative League Congress H. O. Sankari, President, Northern States Cooperative Youth League AFTER four years of experience, the Cooperative Youth League of the North Central States lends firm conviction to the belief that cooperative education of youth can and should be tied up with the every-day work of the movement. No Paternalism Please The cooperative youth organization needs and deserves the unreserved sup port of adult cooperators, both moral and material. But the help given a youth organization must not become paternalistic. The wrong attitude may stifle the interest and enthusiasm of the young people. There have been cases where this has Tîâppened. The youth developed no initiative to work things out for themselves. They had been taught to expect too much. Youth can and will play an impor tant part in the forward march of co operation, if they are consolidated into a working group. Their work has al ready earned recognition, though it still is small. The Work o£ the Youth League The Cooperative Youth League of the Northern States, the Central States Cooperative Youth League, and the Massachusetts Cooperative Youth League have a total membership of around 2,000. Of the 34 young people who attended the Cooperative Train ing school conducted by the Central Cooperative Wholesale and the North ern States Cooperative League, about 50% are active members of the Co operative Youth League. About 25% of them are former students of the co operative youth educational courses held there in previous years. Short term summer schools have proven very valuable in developing a group of cooperatively minded youth. Experience on educational committees and boards of directors of local coop eratives has developed conscientious workers. Attendance at meetings and lectures, the cooperative press, and other factors have been valuable to many more. But the most dependable for permanence, the most effective and the broadest in its scope is youth's own cooperative organization. Help youth organize, give them sup port and guidance, and you will have an enthusiastic, energetic army of co operative builders. Not only will the future be assured for Cooperation, but valuable aid will be returned right along. Let us build first local groups, then district leagues, and then a national league of cooperative youth. Let us re member "He who has the youth has the future." The Cooperative Movement loses a friend in the N.R.A. organization through the recent death of Mrs. Mary Harriman Rumsey. Mr. A. C. Millington, Treasurer and Manager of the Farmers' Union Cooperative Insurance Company, Omaha, was a pioneer in the development of cooperative insurance. His death is a great loss to the cooperative movement. Cooperative Member Education Condensed from an address to the Cooperative League Congress George W. Jacobson, Midland Cooperative Wholesale DUCATION among the rank and -I—' file members of cooperative organ izations should accomplish two objec tives. First, it should develop at least a small group of conscious cooperators in every community where cooperatives exist. Secondly, it should build good will among all members, patrons, and consumers in general. Creating Conscious Cooperators Among the membership of every co operative there is always a handful of community-minded individuals who serve as the backbone of the organiza tion. It is this intelligent, active, in fluential minority of social-minded men and women we must seek out in the membership of every cooperative asso ciation, arm them with the essential facts to make their cooperative operate with maximum effectiveness, and in spire them with a vision of the cooper ative movement as a potent social sys tem which is capable of gradually and constructively displacing our obsolete profit system. Personal Contact and Institutes It has been our experience that key persons can first be won over to a vi sion of the cooperative program in its broadest aspects best through personal contact. Another effective method of building a nucleus of cooperators in each Ipcal- ity to supplement personal contact, is to hold a cooperative institute or short course in the locality. The Midland Cooperative Wholesale is planning this coming winter to experiment with these local schools. The local cooperative will furnish a place of meeting and ar range for attendance at the course; and the wholesale furnish the instruction and needed literature. Participation and Responsibility Other effective means to reach the minds of key men are to get them to read the literature and periodicals of the movement; attend the district and wholesale meetings, cooperative lec tures and cooperative courses to get the inspiration and bird's-eye view of the movement as a whole. Get them to participate in the meetings and organi zational work of the central organiza tion, because nothing convinces a man more effectively than experience itself. Key individuals with ability, enthu siasm, and social vision and at least one employee and one director, should be induced to constitute the educational committee in every local cooperative. This committee should have a definite appropriation of money from the earn ings of the organization. It should have full power to carry on cooperative edu cation, publicity, and entertainment ac tivities among the members and pa trons, responsible, of course, to the board of directors. At least once a -year these educational committee men should attend a local or district institute to learn new methods, to enlarge their knowledge, and to kindle new enthu siasm. These committee men should meet at least twice a year with the fieldmen or educational director from the central organization and should be supplied with outlines and suggestions at regular intervals to guide them in their work. Experts in Education Educational work is a very special ized job. Before we can hope to have effective educational work we must have people in charge who are espe cially trained for that purpose. Coop erative organizations will have to ap propriate more funds for the personnel of educational departments than they have in the past. We must get over the idea that cooperative education can be achieved without expending money, and that it can be carried on by any Tom, Dick or Harry. We need people trained to do educational work, and must give them sufficient funds with which to work. Then we should expect 10 CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan. 1935 Tan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION 11 very definite results from these educa tional departments. People who carry on educational work and conduct co operative schools must have both edu cational background and practical ex perience in cooperative organizations. These two qualifications are essential; only a person who has had actual ex perience in a cooperative organization can hope to go out and teach other people the essentials of cooperation. An educational department should direct and motivate a well-organized educational machinery functioning in every member cooperative. Only in this way can real results be obtained. Without such local machinery, period icals, literature distribution, local edu cation programs, annual meetings, speakers, entertainments, etc., can be only partially effective. The Purposes of Member Education The purpose of the education should be, first of all, to build understanding and critical loyalty among the members of the movement, and increase member ship and patronage from the consumers in the community as a whole. But the most important aim should be to build understanding, loyalty, and confidence, so the consumers of the community will support the cooperative with patronage and capital, so it can always be grow ing and expanding into new fields of service. They should be sold on a uni fied movement going from the retail unit to the wholesale, on into produc tion, and then to the sources of raw materials. The cooperative oil move ment at present reaches from the farm er's gasoline barrel and the motorist's gasoline tank through retail and whole sale units back to the refinery itself. The first step to make a cooperative popular is to make it succeed as a busi ness enterprise so it can pay patronage dividends and render service. But these results must be popularized and dram atized through publicity. This can be done through advertisements, snappy lectures, illustrated and brief circulars, newspaper articles, write-ups in our own official organs, essay contests in the schools, presentation of plays, fes tivals, moving pictures, entertainments, radio programs, etc. Efficiency and the New Economy In our publicity we should emphasize how the cooperative is distinct and dif ferent from ordinary business. We should present the movement as a na tional and world proposition. This we should do through a uniform slogan, standardized trade brands and de signs, as is now being done in the Na tional Cooperatives, Inc., through uni form color schemes and uniform mer chandising methods. Our brands, ad vertisements, and places of business should symbolize a consistent quality of merchandise, and an enticing sys tem of service. Displays of goods should be attractive, attendants should be neat and courteous, prices competi tive, and service adequate. Every cau tion should be exercised to create a consumers' confidence in our system and consumers' acceptance of our branded goods. We must make our business system modern and nation wide. Americans like the band wagon. We can make Consumers' Cooperation America's band wagon, if we adopt big business efficiency in practical matters, and the zeal of a social missionary in our educational activity. Our publicity and education must present cooperation not only as an ef ficient economic system, but as an in strument for the just distribution of wealth and control of economic power; as a means of retaining personal liber ty, priming private initiative, and re gaining rank and file ownership of America. Folk Schools for America We should make every effort to get the existing school system to help us in teaching the facts about consumers' co operation. As we attempt to make fun damental changes, however, it may be necessary for us to increasingly es tablish our own schools and mediums of conveying information to our pa trons and the public at large. The co operative movement of Denmark was made possible because it established the folk high schools which were free from the domination of the established school system of that day. The labor movements both of this country and of European countries have had to es tablish their own schools to teach the facts of workers' economics to the masses. The consumers' cooperative movement will also find it necessary to follow this same course of action in its educational work, if we plan to train workers and educate members who will become conscious of the job of building a better economic system. Local Membership Education Condensed from an afldress to the Cooperative League Congress Edward Carlson, President, Central States Cooperative League THE education of the members in a small cooperative society is much easier than in a large society. In a small society nearly every member is ac quainted with every other member or perhaps they are related or bound to gether by personal friendship. The members of a small cooperative society very often take as much interest in their society as they do in their own family. Of course there are members in small societies that care very little whether the society exists or not, but this is al- sc true of members of a private family. As a rule, if the society has a good cooperator for a manager, an intelli gent board of directors, and the charter members well informed of the coopera tive principles there will be very little difficulty in getting the new members to attend meetings, read the literature, join the guilds, youth leagues, study circles or to take part in any other ac tivities that the society or movement is sponsoring. Personally, I believe that when any new society is organized the education of the members should be done before any business activities are started. If this is done, many costly er rors will be avoided. The education of the members of a larger and older so ciety is, of course, a more difficult task. I believe that there are very few, if any, of our American cooperative so cieties that have a membership of 2,000 or more that can get more than 500 to the meetings. This lack of interest from the large portion of the membership in their own affairs is mainly the lack of cooperative education, but there are other reasons also. First, the meetings are not properly conducted and too dry. Second, the reports are too tech nical for people without an economic education to understand. These diffi culties could easily be removed by con ducting classes in parliamentary law, by opening and closing the meetings by singing cooperative songs in unison, or by having someone make a talk on some timely subject. Even if these suggestions were carried out, and would bring good results, we should still be confronted with the problems of how to make cooperators of those members who are inactive or active in other movements which are indifferent to the cooperative movement. This is a very vital problem for every coopera tive society in the U. S. A. and it must be solved before the solution of other problems can be possible. The education of all the members cannot be accomplished unless the edu cation of the general public is also in cluded. Leaving out the great number of educational activities that are mak ing progress in this country, I suggest only the three following proposals: 1. That every member should be a sub scriber to at least one of our papers. 2. That The Cooperative League send out a weekly or monthly bulletin to all friendly newspapers in the U. S. A. 3. That the cooperative societies take the initiative for calling county con ferences of friendly organizations in their respective counties for the pur pose of greater contact between the consumers cooperative societies and the different labor and farmers labor groups. 12 CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan. 1935 Cooperative Employee Education Condensed from an address to the Cooperative League Congress George Halonen, Educational Director, Central Cooperative Wholesale Jan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION 13 A LTHOUGH definite figures are •*• ^- lacking, we can safely assume that the consumers' cooperative move ment in the U. S. A. hires at least ten thousand employees. What a for midable force to strengthen and expand our movement, if these employees were imbued with the cooperative ideas and knowledge of its principles and meth ods. The history of the American coop erative movement proves that in the past as well as at the present time, many societies which failed can trace the cause to lack of cooperative knowl edge on the part of management and employees. We should learn from the past, dearly bought lessons. In connec tion with the general cooperative edu cational work, special stress should be laid on employee education. In the Northern States the Central Cooperative Wholesale has been pio neering in this field. It has conducted eleven annual Cooperative Training Schools, mostly on eight weeks' basis. These schools have been partly tech nical but a great part of the curriculum consisted of such subjects as history, principles and methods of consumers' cooperation. Also such schools have been conducted under the auspices of the Northern States Cooperative League. The Cooperative Youth League has arranged three summer schools. The Northern States Cooper ative League has been instrumental in organizing Summer Institutes for both employees and membership in general. The last annual meeting of the Central Cooperative Wholesale instructed the Educational Department to arrange at least two technical lectures in six sub- districts of the Wholesale territory. A few lectures of this type have already been held. However, taking into consideration the whole nation, it becomes clear that first of all we need unification of em ployee education. And we expect that The Cooperative League will be the main factor in this work. First of all we need a cooperative Hand Book, which should contain both technical and theoretical information. We have now many cooperative wholesales and dis trict Leagues and therefore can assume that, if properly handled, this Hand Book would be a paying proposal. Our cooperative movement is ex panding. Let us not forget the impor tance of the education of cooperative employees. Schools For Cooperative Employees Condensed from an address to the Cooperative League Congress V. S. Alanne, Executive Secretary, Northern States Cooperative League BOTH the Central Cooperative Wholesale and the Northern States Cooperative League have conducted special courses or training schools to develop managers and bookkeepers for the cooperative societies and to im prove the efficiency of the cooperative employees in general. The initiative in this field was taken by the Central Co operative Wholesale. The first "Co operative Course" was conducted in Superior, Wisconsin, in 1918 and cov ered only one week. Bookkeeping was the only subject taught. The following year cooperative subjects were added and the courses extended to cover a period of four weeks. This year the Northern States Co operative League cooperated with the Central Cooperative Wholesale in con ducting an eight-week training school in Superior, Wisconsin. The school has now become so popular in the C. C. W. group that more than 80 applica tions were received for the present ses sion. Of these applications nearly 60% had to be rejected on account of lack of accommodations and because a class of more than 35 students was consid ered too cumbersome to handle. Training Cooperative Managers The subjects taught at this training school are those considered most im portant in developing good managers and bookkeepers for the cooperative stores. To show the students the eco nomic and social background of Con sumers' Cooperation, they are taught Economics and Social Theory. Educa tion directed specifically to the crea tion of intelligent cooperators includes courses in: Principles and Methods of Consumers' Cooperation, Organization and Administration of Cooperative So cieties, Merchandising, Cooperative Store Management, Business English, Business Correspondence and Com mercial Arithmetic. Lreneral class pe riods are devoted to special lectures. This program has been developed the last 16 years and could be easily modi fied to suit also the requirements of the cooperative gasoline and oil associa tions. Trends of Development All of the 34 students enrolled in the course this year were between the ages of 20 and 25. The school has become more and more a school for the training of people already employed by the cooperatives. About. 70% of the students "attending had served as full- time or part-time employees in various cooperatives. The number of students who have finished a high school course before attending the cooperative train ing school is increasing from year to year. The majority of those who at tended the most recent school in Su perior are high school graduates. It is impossible to over estimate the importance of this kind of a training school, particularly for a group like that of the C. C. W. stores. Most of the managers of these stores have at tended the cooperative courses or co operative training schools conducted in the past years either by the Central Cooperative Wholesale or the North ern States Cooperative League. They are the staunchest supporters of the Wholesale and keenly appreciate the importance of education in coopera tion. Summer Institutes The Summer Institutes, conducted by the Northern States Cooperative League, are another instrument of co operative employee education the im portance of which should not be over looked. Last summer (1934) two dif ferent institutes were held (at Maple Plain and Moose Lake in Minnesota) with a total attendance of 81, an in crease of 280% over the attendance in 1933. The majority of those who have so far attended our summer institutes have no.t been employees of the cooperatives but a consiuerable number of coopera tive managers and employees have availed themselves of the institute as a means of becoming familiar with the principles and methods of the Coopera tive Movement. Cooperative Journalism Condensed from an address to the Cooperative League Congress A. J. Hayes. Editor, The Cooperative Builder ' I 'HE development of a flourishing -*- cooperative journalism in America is necessary if the consumers' move ment is to become a national factor in the economic life of this country. To reach millions of people with our mes sage, information and guidance, is a matter that requires use of the most ef fective, consistent and authoritative channels of publicity; that means the widest possible use of all those me diums which are commonly included under the one word, "press." The question might be broadly di vided under two heads: (1) the devel opment of oiir own cooperative press; (2) the extent to which the non-coop erative press, and particularly labor 14 CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan. 1935 Jan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION 15 F and progressive journals of all kinds; may be utilized. As far as our own press is con cerned, we undoubtedly have very good beginnings in the various publi cations already being issued by The League itself and by the central organ izations affiliated with it. Better coor dination among them than heretofore is the present need for further improv ing them. That means working out some plan for convenient exchange of news and other material to keep all sections in touch with each other. This would greatly assist those publications which otherwise tend to remain entire ly too self-centered and localized, by providing them with current news and views of the entire movement. It would also assist in unifying the policies of all of them along bonafide cooperative lines. The other important question re garding our cooperative press concerns the movement's recognition of its value and consequent willingness to support and finance it adequately. In this res pect there is much room for improve ment, especially where "economy" is preached shortsightedly at the expense of vitally necessary educational work and the development of our own pub lications. No opportunity should be overlooked to impress upon the move ment that maintenance of our coopera tive journals and their future develop ment should be considered one of the really necessary and worthwhile obli gations if we are to expect our enter prises and the movement at large to thrive. Some of the labor papers and an en couraging list of liberal and progress ive publications, including organs of a number of religious groups, are today giving no small attention—and space— to consumers' cooperation. It is obvious that, for the most part at least, they are dependent upon our organizations and cooperative writers for their material. A cooperative news exchange could readily serve them also. In addition, we should encourage cooperative leaders and those of our members who have especial journalistic ability to contrib ute to the outside press as well as to our own. Developing Channels of Enlightenment Condensed from an address to the Cooperative League Congress James R. Moore, Editor, Ohio Farm Bureau News 'T'HE function of the journalist in the J- cooperative movement is more im portant than the function of the jour nalist in a private organization. Coop eration has yet to be sold to most of the people and it is through publicity that most of this "selling" will have to be done. Cooperation, in this country, is rela tively new and somewhat unproved. It is operating on a comparatively small scale. Against the forces of strongly organized and formidable big business, with its million-dollar advertising budg ets, its intrenched powers and influ ence, the lone cooperative, struggling for a foothold, finds itself quite out weighed in the matter of influencing those whom it attempts to convert- the public. It is my opinion that a carefully or ganized system of publicity can do much to change this situation. The average man, were he fully acquainted with the purposes and ideals of cooper ation, would prefer it to the present system of competitive business, which is today so sadly demoralized. Of all enterprises, the cooperative movement has been almost the only one that has grown steadily and noticeably during the depression. This is to be attributed to the fact that cooperation has demon strated its superiority over other sys tems and that people are learning about it. Yet by far the majority of people ac cept the old system. It never occurs to them, in fact, that any other method is possible. That cooperation has but made a beginning is due primarily to the fact that it has scarcely made itself heard. Prospering When Competition Fails The problem of educating the great mass of American citizens to coopera tion is not an easy one, principally be cause they have so long lived in a sys tem where private profit and produc tion for exchange are accepted as the purposes of the system. In a time of economic uncertainty, such as we have witnessed during the last four years, this great mass of people is more re ceptive to an idea that will restore their lost security. In such times cooperation tends to grow and private business tends to slump. It succeeds in times of adversity, when private endeavor does not. The success of our existing coop eratives can be duplicated if a sufficient appeal is made to the public, through an extensive system of publicity de signed to enlighten people on the prin ciples of a movement that can succeed when capitalism fails. "Every Farmer a Cooperator" In our own cooperatives, affiliated with the Ohio Farm Bureau, under which are organized cooperative auto mobile and fire insurance companies, cooperative purchasing and marketing associations, and cooperative credit as sociations, we have attempted to make every farmer a cooperator. The extent to which we have succeeded is indi cated by the fact that in eight years our automobile insurance company has grown to a 3J/2 million dollar company, insuring more than 135,000 cars. Our cooperative marketing and purchasing associations have an outlet in nearly every county in Ohio, supplying our farmers with petroleum products, ma chinery, coal, food, seed, paint, fence, twine, harness, etc., on a cooperative basis. Our business has grown every year. We have had, of coures, some thing tangible to offer them, but we have also let them know about it. Our monthly magazine, the Ohio Farm Bureau News, goes to every member of our organization. It is a thirty-two page publication to which both authorities on cooperation and our leading members contribute. It is put out to be read and not simply admired and' has converted many luke-warm farmers into enthusiastic cooperators. Our weekly press service is sent to each of Ohio's 500 newspapers. The results are checked in our office by a clipping service and we have been very much satisfied by the cooperation given us by editors. Channels of Enlightenment Special articles are written to news papers or magazines upon request. One large Ohio newspaper has printed a series of articles in its Sunday editions on Cooperation in Ohio that was sup plied by us. We supply articles for other cooperative publications, as well as trade papers of any sort. We also encourage each of our county Farm Bureau units to issue a .small, four page newspaper each month for the benefit of members in particular counties. We send out a monthly bulletin of material suitable for use in these county papers. The remainder of the paper is to be filled with local news. We reach another large class of peo ple by the radio. We have a regular half-hour weekly broadcast over sta tion WLW, Cincinnati, and a daily broadcast of half an hour over station WAIH, Columbus. Any degree of effective publicity, of course, depends on a well trained and capable staff. Cooperative organization budgets too often neglect publicity and as a consequence many of the potential possibilities of cooperation are not real ized. More and more it is becoming evi dent that cooperation offers the best way out for a nation economically sick. We find religious agencies, churches and church groups, economists and col leges supporting it. These are the peo ple who have been enlightened on the subject. There is no reason, in my opinion, why the public in general could not be influenced to give the same support if they are given the in formation necessary. And when that time comes we will find ourselves in the midst of a profound economic change — a change that promises to bring ownership back to the people. 16 CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan. 1935 Tan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION 17 A University Promotes Cooperation Condensed from an address to the Cooperative League Congress Rev. Dr. M. M. Coady, Extension Division, St. Francis Xavier University, Antigonish, Nova Scotia A CCORDING to the last census •*•*• Nova Scotia, Canada, had a pop ulation of slightly over 500,000. In race the people are mainly of Scotch, Irish, English and French origin. On the 5,500 miles of eastern Canadian coast line, 40,000 fishermen are scattered in small towns and villages; 12,000 coal- miners and 4,000 steel-workers are to be found in two areas in eastern Nova Scotia. For the rest, the population is mainly engaged in farming of various kinds, and lumbering. The immediate constituency of St. Francis Xavier's College is the seven eastern counties of Nova Scotia, with a population of approximately 200,000 people. In this territory nearly all the coal-miners and steel-workers are to be found. The People's School During the past 25 years St. Francis Xavier's College has tried in various ways to carry knowledge to these adult groups, especially to the farming groups. One of the most notable at tempts was the formation of what was called the People's School, carried on for two years at two different points in the area. The success attending these rather spasmodic efforts finally re sulted in the foundation of an Exten sion Department in 1928 which would carry on a systematic program of Adult Education among the people. The St. Francis Xavier movement is not a correspondence or lecture course. Members of the Extension Staff go out to the people and organize them into small study groups^—an average of ten to a group. A leader is selected by the members of each group and these members are pledged to meet weekly during the fall and winter ; aonths, and to carry out a series of ! tudies outlined by the Department. I 'uring the last year 952 such groups, both men and women, were actively engaged in study. Study material is furnished these groups through a bi-monthly publica tion called the Extension Bulletin, a circulating library, and an Open Shelf library, from which the people may borrow books and pamphlets according to their needs. In addition to this a school is conducted for four weeks at the University each year, for the pur pose of training community leaders to carry on the various activities arising out of the people's studies. Educating for Democratic Action The first essential in promoting the welfare of the common people is to have a program that will point to a so ciety built upon Social Justice. There are two possible ways of bringing men to a realization of the kind of society that we would call so cially just. The first is through dic tatorship. The second, democracy, is based, not on external force, which is so characteristic of all the dictatorships we know, but is rather founded on the force of ideas operating in the minds of a free and enlightened people. This has been the fundamental idea which has brought the peoples of the western world thus far, and the effectiveness of such philosophy is now on trial. We feel that democracy will stand or fall on the realization of this ideal. Can the common people of North America be sufficiently educated and motivated to do voluntarily what dic tatorships of the right or left are trying to do? That is the great question con fronting all of us. Scientific investiga tion has demonstrated with sufficient certitude that adults can learn. In our Antigonish program we begin by or ganizing the people to explore their economic possibilities. A simple people are not likely to study just for study's sake. They must see their mental ac tivities issue in some concrete results. Their thinking must pay, in other words, if they are to be long interested. As practical educators, we therefore proceed on the fundamental principle that adult study must issue in economic ventures of various kinds to be inter esting and permanent. Again, the eco nomic question looms so big today that one might say it is the great social, political, and even religious question of the hour. Everything is in danger as long as this universal problem remains unsolved. How the People Control Their Own Economic Destiny The question now arises how the common people of the earth can manip ulate financial forces for their own good—how they can get their hands on the throttle of their own economic destiny, and, as it were, climb into the driver's seat. The solution of this is at hand. The general remedy for this state of affairs is to bring the common people to that point of intelligence and effi ciency where they can do for them selves what they have been paying others so dearly to do for them in the past. Not only will such a move give them some measure of economic free dom but it will also serve as the great est possible instrument of their educa tion and their intellectual and spiritual advancement. This opens the door to the whole realm of group action in the economic field, or what is commonly called Cooperation. Fields of Activity Following this principle, we in Anti gonish are putting forth every effort to have the people engage in group action in the four possible fields open to them. (a) The Consumers' Cooperative Society, or the so-called Cooperative Store, is gaining great ground. Already 18 such societies are functioning in eastern Nova Scotia alone, and some of them are among the most successful on the North American, continent. (b) The field of finance opens up great possibilities -for the common peo ple. Those who control money and credit in the nation control most other things too. To give the people some measure of financial independence we promote the Credit Union of which Sir Horace Plunkett once said: "The Credit Union idea is a discovery as im portant for the financial order of the world as steam was for the industrial order." After a little less than two years of activity we have succeeded in establishing among very poor people 27 Credit Unions, and the total money controlled by these little groups to date is $90,000. It may well be that this means of taking care of their own credit needs is the foundation for other activities that will result in the recon struction of society. (c) Already in Nova Scotia many plants such as processing and manu facturing plants are owned and oper ated by the primary producers. This idea can be extended among labourers. In England the cooperative movement now operates 150 manufacturing plants. There is the germ here of an or dered society where production is for use and an ascertained need. The great cooperative retail business of the Old Country serves as the distributing agency for this production and elimi nates to that extent the scramble for markets which is so characteristic of the present industrial set-up. (d) Primary producers of all kinds can get further control of their own business by organizing for marketing purposes. Not only is group action ab solutely necessary in this field for greater economic returns, but it is im possible for small producers in any other way to have volume of quality and standard goods without it. A large part of our people are small farmers and fishermen, and their success will be determined in great measure by the growth of this movement. We are pro moting a great variety of organizations in this field. Cooperation and Human Values The institutions growing out of this group action will give new shape and form to our civilization. They will be the concrete embodiment of justice and 18 CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan. 1935 Tan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION 19 charity. Througn them the people will have an opportunity to rise to the full stature of citizenship. The common people of our respective countries in the main, up to the present, have not been permitted to function in the fields of business and finance. All their think ing has been done for them, and yet ac tivity in these fields is a very vital part of citizenship. They are supposed to carry on cooperative ventures of a civic and political nature in the running of their respective communities and coun- tries, but have not yet learned to carry on successfully group action in the eco nomic field •which is, as everybody •knows, fundamental to real and ef fective political action. As a conse quence the rank and file of our people are not taking serious responsibility in the political field where their will is supposed to be law. Something new has to come into the life of the people. Something is funda mentally wrong with our present way of training for citizenship. Our church es and our schools have worked in cessantly for generations, but their ef forts, judging by results, have been nullified to a great extent by the sys tem under which we are living. Permit the common man—the labourer and the primary producer—to cross the line and enter the field of business and finance, and the way is clear for a new type of citizen. Without this it is prob ably true that there are not enough teachers or preachers in North Amer ica to clean up the mess in which we find ourselves. Kagawa and Cooperation in Japan Condensed from an a'ddress to the Cooperative League Congress Miss Helen Topping, Secretary to Toyohiko Kagawa, the Great Ethical Leader in Japan A MERICA is the youngest, biggest, •L\ and richest of the great world powers; Japan the oldest, smallest and poorest of them. Such extremes of dif ference tend to misunderstanding, espe cially just now when cheap Japanese goods, sold in American markets, are creating a feeling of economic competi tion. The solution lies not in war and violence. The solution of the problem of competition between Japan's and America's trade lies in the development of the Cooperative Movement in both countries, and in all countries of the world. Japan's .cooperatives began about 1900 and now embrace a third of her population. Japan's cooperative maga zine is the largest in the world in its monthly paid up circulation. By meas ured gains of twenty to forty thou sand monthly this magazine is now nearing the million mark and will reach it before the year's end. The cooperative magazine is within the comprehension of every primary school graduate in Japan, which means 99 per cent of the total population. For one subscriber the magazine has twelve readers, and all over the rural districts the farmer families meet informally in the evenings for recreation and to read this publication, which is designed to educate non-members of the coopera tives up to the point at which they, will join the movement. The promotion of the use of this magazine is part of a five year expansion program of the co operatives in Japan, which has made its goals, year by year, since it started in January, 1933. Save Society First The most outstanding person build ing the cooperative movement in Japan, is Toyohiko Kagawa. He was taught Confucian precepts by Buddhist priests in his boyhood, "Be a saint!" "Be a gentleman!" Kagawa-spent his days in agony because he had neither saint nor gentleman around him to imitate, and all society was rotten. When an Amer ican missionary introduced him to the character of Christ in the English Bible, he discovered the saint he was needing and prayed to be like him. At 21 Kagawa went to live in the slums to try to abolish them. After five years, during which he served the personal needs of individuals without limit, he said, "One individual working for in dividuals cannot change society." Labor Organization For five years Kagawa organized the Japan Federation of Labor. He started the first labor school, and first labor newspaper, then the Federation. But employee-control of the tools of labor could not be won, Kagawa found, on any large scale, without winning other goals first, and besides, it was only part of the picture. Political Organization After organizing the factory labor ers, Kagawa organized also the Farm ers' National Federation, and then got both farmers and laborers together to get the universal manhood suffrage which was needed beîore anything could be done to secure voter-control through government. The farmers and laborers together put over the top a movement for the suffrage which had failed for thirty years with only the in tellectuals behind it. Now Kagawa is continually at work to elect farmer and labor candidates to .the National Diet. His closest associate, Sugiyama, has been leader of the farm bloc in the Diet since 1932. Voter control is coming slowly, but is after all, like employee- control only a minor part of the pic ture. Consumer Organization Kagawa has learned to place his main emphasis on consumer control and on organizing farmers, laborers, and all classes in Japan into the cooper ative movement. After having organ ized the farmers and laborers, Kagawa went on to win also the social workers and the church workers to his concep tion of society, and they are being edu cated by him in large numbers to the cooperative movement. Since 1918 he has devoted his con centrated efforts to the cooperative movement, starting consumers' cooper atives among city laborers, working to make the rural credit unions serve the tenant farmers and developing trained and ethical leadership. Creating Cooperative Leadership Kagawa founded one folk school based on the Danish system to serve as a model and has several others un der his personal control scattered over the country, and has stimulated about 90 schools in all into existence by preaching the idea. He is recruiting leaders from univer sity students in five big Tokyo univer sities, in each of which he has started consumer cooperatives, held together by a federation and full time secretary. Thus the intelligentsia are learning to spend their lives after graduation in the cooperative movement. University graduates find it hard to get jobs now. Kagawa teaches them that no grad uate need ever be out of a job. Let him organize a cooperative and then run it. Thus he can create his own job. There are plenty of communities waiting for his services in such a capacity. He says the same to the clergy. Many ministers are now unemployed in Japan as elsewhere. Kagawa tells them to go and organize cooperatives, and to organize the theological sem inaries so that their students, in student days, may master the technique of co operatives. Kagawa is also educating the physi cians and nurses of Japan to participa tion in the cooperative movement, and in the last three years 140 medical co operative hospitals have been started largely due to his promotion work. The percentage of poverty caused by sick ness is a large and well known factor. The medical cooperative has reduced the amount the farmer spends for doc toring from 28 to 9 per cent of his an nual income, on the average, in some of Japan's northern and most famine- stricken provinces. Kagawa has now the opportunity to educate social workers to the coopera tive movement, province by province. The governors gather them in for an nual institutes and give Kagawa the entire time of the meeting. He tells the in "linn 20 CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan.1935 Jan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION 21 111 iilll" social workers that all philanthropy, charity and relief will eventually be taken care of by the surpluses of a ful ly organized producer-consumer econ omy, on a democratic basis. He calls this type mutual aid cooperatives, and includes under it the cooperative hos pitals above mentioned. Teaching the Masses Economic Democracy Kagawa educated the mass of the Japanese people through his books, of which he has published more than six ty, and through his audiences. He has had more than a million in his recent meetings and is counted as eloquent as any Japanese speaker. More than a mil lion others have bought copies of hts books. Kagawa is an important potential factor on the horizon of the interna tional cooperative movement, partly because of the way in which he is edu cating the hitherto unreached classes. He is to go to Australia next February to its Centennial celebration, and was in the Philippines last February. He has been three times to America and once through the Continent of Europe, but many times to China. Translations of his books into European languages have an increasing sale, and he is re ceiving many invitations, to India, etc. In 1931 in America he spoke in 16 uni versities and colleges on the coopera tive movement. They did not know what he was talking about then, but they will know next time. When he comes to America in 1936 his visit should be capitalized to introduce the cooperative movement to new groups in intellectual and religious headquar ters. Economic Foundations for World Peace Although only 46, Kagawa is already a world wide authority among pro testant Christians. With the Coopera tive Internationale as his avowed ob jective, his word carries in twenty countries. Lenin tried to save his coun try by violence and a dictatorship of the proletariat. Gandhi eschews vio lence and in the most caste-ridden country in the world, aims at reconcil iation among all classes. Kagawa is with him in these points but goes way ahead of him in the matter of coopera tion. He cooperates with his govern ment without becoming a slave to it, but rather giving a valuable example of how government can be made to serve the cooperatives organized by the peo ple. He cooperates with the machine age, teaching that the machine can be fully subjugated to the service of hu manity, through the cooperative owner ship of the means of production. Kagawa is a great prophetic example to Western Christians of leadership in the cooperative movement. His con centration on, and commitment to, the cooperative movement makes him one of the world's great cooperators, and there is much to be looked forward to in cooperating with him in the future. Cooperators in Action Cooperative Insurance Tackles New Jobs Close on the heels of the announce ment of the formation of the Coopera tors' Life Association, designed to take the exploitation out of life insurance, came the announcement that Work- mens' Furniture Fire Insurance Com pany of New York has been reincorpo- rated as the Workmens' Mutual Fire Insurance Society, Inc. This change makes it possible to insure dwellings as well as furniture and to extend the. service of cooperative fire insurance to states other than New York in which Workmens' Furniture Fire Insurance Society has been doing business. This, organization has been in active opera tion for sixty-two years on a sound financial basis. Application is being made and cooperative furniture fire in surance will probably be available on a national scale after the first of July, 1935. Protection for household fur nishings without the toll charged by private profit insurance companies will provide insurance at a uniformly low rate in what are usually high cost areas. The Farm Bureau Mutual Automo bile Insurance Company, Columbus, Ohio, has been advanced to an "A Plus" (Excellent) rating on the basis of its financial statement as of Septem ber 30, 1934, according to the Alfred M. Best Company Bulletin Service. This is a rating accorded to very few insurance companies. The Farm Bu reau Mutual Automobile Insurance Co. has enjoyed an "A" rating for several years. Efficiency, coupled with the economy of non-profit operation places the cooperatives again ahead of private business. The Continuation Committee on In surance and Banking appointed at the Congress of The Cooperative League headed by Murray D. Lincoln, Execu tive Secretary of the Ohio Farm Bu reau Federation is taking steps to meet the immediate problem of concentrat ing insurance on cooperative associa tions in insurance companies within the movement and makina possible collec tive purchasing of insurance which cannot at present be furnished by co operative companies. One of the first results from the insurance committee will be the early possibility of placing fidelity bonds for cooperative employ ees in an established cooperative in surance company. A single clearing house for the movement may be es tablished with the existing machinery to facilitate collective bargaininq with such "old line" companies as the co operatives may find it necessary to patronize. • More Schools in Cooperation Education is the basis of Coopera tion. With this slogan in mind, Union Oil Company Cooperative with head quarters in North Kansas City com pleted a series of nine Managers' and Directors' meetings early in November. More than a thousand leaders repre- sentinq 183 local associations attended. Midland Cooperative Oil Associa tion is now conducting a series of mem ber schools. Courses are taught one night a week at local cooperative or ganizations with rotating dates so that speakers from the wholesale give lec tures consecutive nights throughout the week. Midland is also sponsoring an "Oil School" for employees early in January to instruct managers and at tendants in the technical aspects of the oil business. Midland will also conduct a five week Employee Training School early in February to give employees a general background in the economics of Cooperation as well as technical training for immediate jobs. The Cooperative Institute at May- nard, Massachusetts, sponsored by the Eastern States Cooperative League, began its sessions early in November and is furnishing instruction in ele mentary economics and philosophy, current events and cooperation in theory and practice. The Ohio Farm Bureau Cooperative Association in cooperation with the , Adult Education Division of the FERA . conducted a teachers' training institute Dec. 17-21. During this institute 160 teachers were provided the fundamen tals of cooperative history, principles and recreation, preparatory to an ex tensive program of general education of members and non^members throughout the state. The Indiana Farm Bureau Cooperative Association's education program conducted with the assistance , of the FERA, was launched in Novem ber with 196 teachers and an enroll ment of approximately 12,000 adult stu dents. Central Cooperative Wholesale, working in cooperation with the North ern States Cooperative League grad uated 34 students from its eight week training school November 17. An Institute of the Cooperative Movement was held at the Ashland Folk School, Grant, Michigan, Novem ber 23-25 with Carl R. Hutchinson acting as Dean. Mr. I. H. Hull, man ager of the Indiana Farm Bureau Co operative Association addressed the Institute on "What I Saw in Europe." Several round table discussions were held on Cooperative Purchasing, Mar keting and Credit Unions, and the n lii CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan.1935 Tan. 1935 CONSUMERS COOPERATION 23 delegates to the Institute laid out an educational program for the coopera tive movement in Michigan. Judson Memorial Church, famous for its social service work in the heart of New York City, held a Cooperative Conference in November which was addressed by Professor Horace M. Kal- len, E. R. Bowen and Rev. Laurence Hosie, pastor of Judson Memorial Church. The Continuation Committee of the Conference is now conducting a six weeks' training course to prepare speakers for the cooperative movement. • Education Through Action It is a fundamental principle of edu cation that people learn by doing. Con sumers' Cooperation is no exception to that rule. Cooperative Distributors, 30 Irving Place, New York City, make it possible to combine education and action for individuals and groups who are con cerned with acquiring a thorough knowledge of and experience in Con sumers' Cooperation without organ izing a large scale cooperative oil sta tion, milk route, credit union or retail store. Cooperative Distributors com bines research into the quality of com modities with cooperative purchasing of tested articles and ships its products on a mail order basis to its members. The organization already has eleven full time employees and eighteen af filiated buying clubs in he United States. Its publication, Consumers' De fender, features articles of interest to exploited consumers and a catalog of goods available. It is now possible for individuals and groups to practice cooperative buying of tooth brushes, shirts, hosiery, ink, and a multitude of other commodities while they study the history and prin ciples of the movement. Cooperative Distributors offers education through action. Individuals or groups may se cure a catalog of products available by writing 30 Irving Place, New York City. Consumers' Cooperation in Current Literature "CTERE is one of the reasons for •** -*- America's "economic illiteracy." In the first 28 years since the turn of the century only 27 articles on con sumption economics (less than one a year) appeared in current periodicals. The public could not well learn of co operation when there was almost noth ing in the periodicals they read. Since the last issue of Cooperation went to press the following articles have come to our attention. A Kick and a Boost Warren C. Platt, Editor of National Petroleum News, wrote in his journal of November 14, an article on "The Cooperative Movement in America and What it Means to the Oil Industry and Private Enterprise in General." Mr. Platt, prompted by the tremendous in roads cooperatives have made in the petroleum industry, has made a careful study of the cooperative movement and concludes that the co-ops are here to stay. He suggests that private business can learn the following lessons from the cooperatives and must discover a means of meeting these advantages if it is to prevent further inroads into pri vate business. These are the advan tages he attributes to the movement: "It knows that the interest of the consumer must always be first. The members are actually owners of the business and have a pride of owner ship even though the member has on ly one share. The cooperative move ment is a spiritual, emotional move ment as well as a commercial one." Mr. Platt urges active opposition to these 1500 oil cooperatives which did $35,000,000 business last year and re turned $5,000,000 to members in pat ronage dividends thus cutting seriously into the profits of large oil distributors. 23.5% Savings on Capital Stock Investment Miss Florence E. Parker of the United States Bureau of Labor Statis tics has written in the November issue of the Monthly Labor Review a sum mary of the "Operation of Local Con sumers' Cooperative Societies in 1933." The study deals chiefly with mercantile and oil cooperatives and does not at tempt to cover the entire field of Con sumers' Cooperatives. Miss Parker fur nishes some very impressive statistics. "534 societies which reported the re sults of their trading operations for 1933, made net savings of $1,935,996 which represented 5.5 per cent if fig ured on sales and 23.5 per cent if fig ured on capital stock ... In spite of the adverse business conditions the socie ties (534 of a total of 6,600 in the U. S. reporting) were able to effect, during the four year period, trading gains amounting to $7,419,990." Common Sense for December fea tured an article by Meyer Parodneck, delegate to the recent Congress of the International Cooperative Alliance in London, entitled "Cooperatives in Eu rope." Consumers' Guide, published by the Consumers' Counsel of the AAA, Washington, D. C., October 29, 1934, carried an article entitled "Pocketing the Difference" in which James R. Moore, Editor of the Ohio Farm Bu reau News described the rapid growth of the Farm Bureau Cooperative Auto mobile Insurance Company. In an ear lier issue of Consumers' Guide Mr. J. Liukku, Manager of the Cooperative Trading Company, Waukegan, Illinois, described the great development of co operative distribution of milk. The Commerce Bulletin, student pub lication of the School of Commerce, New York University, is running a series of editorials on Consumers' Co operation as a solution for the present problems of distribution. The World Call for December fea tures an article by Powers Luce on "Christ and Cooperatives," and Metro politan Church Life, published in New York City, announced December 13th a six weeks' training course in the philosophy and methods of Consumers' Cooperation. • The Index of Vol. XX. 1934, Coop eration will be sent free on request. The Canadian Cooperator Brantford, Ontario, Canada The organ of the Canadian Coopera tive Movement, owned by and coo- ducted under the auspices of The Cooperative Union of Canada. Published monthly 75c per annum FIRE INSURANCE ON YOUR FURNITURE SAFE-ECONOMICAL-COOPERATIVE WORKMEN'S FURNITURE FIRE INSURANCE SOCIETY 227 East 84th St., New York, N. Y. Member of The Cooperative League of the U. S. A. Under supervision of N. Y. State Insurance Department. The Cooperative Builder The official organ of Northern States Cooperative League Central States Cooperative League Central Cooperative Wholesale An interesting and lively cooperative journal published semi-monthly at Superior, Wis. Subscription rate $1.00 per year. CENTRAL COOPERATIVE WHOLESALE Superior, Wis. Raivaaja Print—Fitehburg, Mass. 24 CONSUMERS COOPERATION Jan. 1935 STUDY CONSUMERS' COOPERATION The books and pamphlets listed below are available through The Cooperative League,, 167 W. 12, N. Y. C. Read them and pass them on to your friends EDUCATIONAL PAMPHLETS Per Copy Per WO 76. What is Consumers' Cooperation .05 4.00 Toad Lane, G. StWart _________________ .05 4.00 69. Story < Chase 84. The Coop. Movement, J. H. Dietrich ________________ .05 4.00 85. Cooperation Here and Abroad, H. T. Hughes _________—— .10 7.00 86. Consumers' Cooperative Methods, J. P. Warbasse, 1934_______ .10 6.00 341. America's Answer—Consumers' Cooperation, E. R. Bowen—___ .10 6.0C 88. The Economic Foundations of World Peace. Toyohiko Kagawa .25 90. Up From The Shadows, Michel Becker—Translated by Arthur Albreicht ______________—— .10 7.00 91. Where the Tall Corn Grows, E, H. H. Holima« L________— .10 7.00 92. Other People's Money, Louiis D. Brandeis _——————————————— .15 ORGANIZATIONAL PAMPHLETS How to Start an.d Run a Roch dale Cooperative Association or Club _____________————— .10 Model By-Laws for a Rochdale Cooperative Society ___————— .05 Credilt Union Primer (By Ham and Robinson) ____———————— .50 Model Lease for Cooperative Apartment House ————————— .10 29. 51. 16. 30. 57. 62. 63. 67. 68. 72. 74. 77. 78. 79. SI. 80. 82. 93. 2.50 MISCELLANEOUS Model Co-op State Law _____ .10 "When the Whistle Blew" (Story, by Bruce Culvert) ———— .06 How a Consumers' Cooperative Differs from Ordinary Business .01 Buttons (League emblem), % inch diameter _—————————— .05 Sign or Transparency of League Emblem. Green and gold, 8 in. diameter _________—————— .26 Stock certificates, engraved, with League Emblem. Bound in books of 100, 200, or 250 To Mothers ________————— .02 Little Lessons in Cooperation The Burden of Credit _____— .02 The Most Necessary Thing in Life ___________________ .02 Are You Sure You Are Getting Your Money's Worth _______ .02 There Are Two Sides to Every Counter ________________ .02 Cooperative Youth Songs ____ .25 Consumers', Credit, and Produc- rtive Societies, Bull. 531 of the Bureau of Labour Statistics__ .25 What Cooperation means to a depression-siok America ————— .03 The Sure Way is the Quick Way .02 1935 Calendar _____________ .20 .75 2.00 15.00 1.00 .35 1.00 1.00 1.00 1.00 2.00 1.00 MONTHLY MAGAZINES Cooperation—(In bundle lots, $7.60 per hundred) Subscription, per year (foreign, $1.26) $1.00 Review of International Cooperation (Pub. by the I. C. A.) ____________ Per Year, $1.50 BOOKS The following books are recommended as con taining ithe best discussion of the modern Co operative Movement. They may be ordered through The League, postpaid on receipt of price. Blanc, Elsie T.: Cooperative Movement in Russia, 1924 ____________,_______ 1.50 Chase and Schlink: Your Money's Worth, A Book for Consumers ____________ 1.10 Flanagan, J. A.: Wholesale Cooperation in Scotland, 1920 __________________ 2.10 Gide, C.: Consumers' Cooperative Socie ties. American edition and notes, 1922 Cloth ________________________ 1.50 Hall, Prof. Fred: Handbook for Members of Cooperative Committees ________ 2.50 Holyoake: Rochdale Pioneers 1892 ____ 1.10 Hough, E. M.: Cooperation in India 1932 3.75 Jessness, O. B. : Cooperative Marketing of Farm Products _________________ 3.10 Kagawa, Toyohiko: Christ and Japan___ 1.00 Kallen, Horace M.: A Free Society_____ 1.00 Life As We Have Known It. Life stories of English guildswomen, telling what the Guild has done for them __________ 1.25 Madams, J. P.: The Story Retold _____ .85 Nioholson, Isa: Our Story ___________ .25 Odhe, Thorsten: Finland, A Nation of Co- operators _____________________ 1.50 Oerne, Andres: Cooperative Ideals and Problems _____________________ 1.36 Poisson, E.: The Cooperative Republic_ 1.85 Potter, B. : Cooperative Movement in Great Britain 1891 ___________________ 1.10 Redfern, Percy: John T. W. Mitchell,(1924) 1.00 Redfern, Percy: The Consumers' Place in Society, 1820 ___________________ 1.00 Russell, George (A. E.) The National Being 1.75 Smith-Gordon & Staples: Rural Recon struction in Ireland, 1918 _________ 1.00 Smith-Gordon and O'Brien: Cooperation in Denmark ______________________ 1.10 Smith-Gordon and O'Brien: Cooperation in Many Lands, 1920 _______________ 1.60 Stolinsky, A.: The Cooperative Movement. (In Yiddish) __________________ 1.00 Totomianz, V; The Place of Cooperation among other movements ————_———— .25 Warbasse, J. P.: Cooperative Democracy (1927) ________________________ 1.50 Warbasse, J.P.: What Is Cooperation, 1927 .75 Warne, C. B. : Consumers' Cooperative Movement in Illinois 1926 _________ 3.50 Webb, B. and S.: The Consumers' Co operative Movement, 19:21 (Board cover) 2.00 Webb, Beatrice: My Apprenticeship, (1.926) 3.00 Webb, Catherine: Industrial Cooperation, ,1917 _________________________ L.-60 Woolf, Leonard: Cooperation and the Fu ture of Industry -___———————————— 1.66 Cooperation, Bound Volumes, 1915 to 1934 inclusive, each year _——————_———— 1.50 The People's Year Book, 1936, English, paper .75, cloth ..———————————————— 1.35 CONSUMERS COOPERATION Organ of the Consumers' Cooperative Purchasing Movement in the U. S. Volume XXI. No. 2 February, 1935 Eternal as the Unending Circle Hardy as the Evergreen Pine EDITORIAL EPIGRAMS The great game of "recovery by lying," as John Flynn so well describes it, goes merrily on. The administration reports "progress," yet the number on relief has increased by nearly twenty per cent. • The monetary reformers who recently met in Washington must eventually get down to bed rock. Instead of including in their program only temporary palliatives attempting to "control" the monetary sys tem they must challenge the people to re cover ownership of their finance structure through cooperative banking. • Those who wish to solve our problems by dictatorships will be pleased with the most recent news item from Italy to the effect that Mussolini is now the "major ity." Of thirteen cabinet posts he now holds seven. Now the world will have a still greater chance to compare the possi bilities of progress through a so-called super-man and democratic super-majori ties. • Dr. Paul H. Nystrom, Professor of Marketing at Columbia University, urged the National Retail Dry Goods Associa tion to "fight monopolies." This is help from a quarter tlhat is welcomed by Cooperators who are committed to the principle of eliminating private monop olies altogether by direct contact between the consumer and producer, with the pro ducers owning "use" property such as farms and homes and the consumers owning business and banking coopera tively. • The New President of the Indiana Farm Bureau Federation, Mr. Lewis Taylor, is on record for Cooperation. In the June 1933 issue of Hoosier Farmer under the title, "We are not Sufficient un to Ourselves," he said,"A critical study of the possibilities of substituting coopera tion for our present corporation system of doing business, might prove of inestimable value, not only to agriculture, but to all in dustry." That statement was prophetic and fortunately he now has the great op portunity of helping to put it more rapidly into practice in the State of Indiana. We welcome such a farm leader to our great cause. • Trade Unions must be awakened. La boring men must be taught that they are consumers as well as producers. The Ex tension iBulletin of St. Francis Xavier An organ to spread the knowledge of the Cooperative Movement, whereby the people, in voluntary association, purchase and produce for their own use the things they need. York Qt m°nthly by The Co°Perative League of the U. S. A., 167 West 12th St., New E. R. Bowen, Editor Contributing Editors ___V. S. Alanne. George Halonen, George Jacobson, James R. Moore, A. W. Warinner Entered as Second Class Matter, December 19, 1917, at the Post Office at New York, N. Y., under the Act of March 3, 1879. Price $1.00 a year. 26 CONSUMERS' COOPERATION February, 1935 February, 1935 CONSUMERS' COOPERATION 27 University of Antigonish, Nova Scotia, says, "Trade Unions Will find in Credit Unions and Consumers' Cooperation tlhe stoutest reinforcements in their fight for social justice." W'ho can solve this prob lem in America of -how to awaken Labor to act as Consumers? It must be done soon. • Jos. Gilbert of the .Midland Cooperative Wholesale says .that "paying back all savings as patronage dividends is like grinding up your seed corn." Yet that's what a lot of cooperatives do. There are even better ways of paying .part of the savings back than in patronage dividends after the proper surpluses have been set up. One is in education, another is in recreation, another in medical services. It's all a question of which is best for the consumers—they own all the savings and can use them as they see fit. In America we have yet to learn .the most effective use of cooperative savings. • "Can anything good come out of Penn sylvania" would have been a pertinent inquiry in the light of the political history of the Mêlions, the Reeds, and others of that dynasty. It is surely a revelation to read from the inaugural address of the in coming Governor Earle this statement, "I see no reason for the relative present security which I personally enjoy by the grace of chance while most of my fellow citizens are never at any time separated by more than a hair from want and misery." A good start toward social thinking. Now let Pennsylvania Cooper- ators start into action and maybe they can produce an Olson in Pennsylvania who will support .tlheir cause. • It's an inspiration to get a letter from one of .tlhe greatest preachers in America, Rev. John Haynes Holmes, and to have him say, "Amen to your letter of the third. You may press me as hard as you please on this matter of cooperation and you'll always find me on your side!" We are urging him to preach a special sermon on Consumers' and Credit Cooperation, as did Rev. Dietrich of Minneapolis. Every-, wholesale Cooperative ought to foe able to get the outstanding liberal preacher in its territory to preacih such a sermon and then republish it. The Community Church of New York City is practicing Cooperation by becoming a member of Cooperative Distributors, Inc., and buy ing its requirements cooperatively. WELCOME TO OUR COMPANY Within a period of ten days thirteen managers of a large Petroleum Company in the Middle West subscribed to the magazine, CONSUMERS' COOPERA TION. We welcome these managers to the company of cooperative readers and will do our best to teach them the principles and business methods of .tlhe great con sumers' cooperative movement. Corpora tions have served America in combining little businesses into larger organizations in the interest of efficiency. This, of course, was ruthlessly done and the effi ciency was in the interest of profits for the few instead of in the interests of the people as a whole. We have now learned that greater efficiency can be secured through consumers' cooperation in the in terests of the common people. The dimes we formerly gave away are going back to the consumers who make these savings possible—to build units of an economic system which will solve our economic equation of "poverty in the midst of plenty." WHY SHOULDN'T A NATION BE PATRIOTIC TOO? We are all asked to be patriotic as in dividuals. And it is right tlhat we should love our country and sacrifice for it if necessary. But our country, or all of us, has just as great obligation towards each of its citizens. A news item says "Frank N. Fitzsim- inons, Chicago war veteran, was gassed and shell shocked while serving overseas in the first division. The other day his body was found. He 'had hanged himself with the cord from an American flag and the folds of the flag were draped about his shoulders in a final gesture of patriotic farewell." > Those who led us into the Great War failed to do as they promised every young soldier, to see that he got his job back when and if he returned. They have a weight of responsibility that makes one wonder how they can read such a news item and fail to do their-utmost to absolve their social sins by encouraging, instead of delaying, real social insurance of every kind as the means of alleviating distress that results in the loss of such a genuine patriot to his country. They also. fail in the still greater obligation they have as leaders to promote the building of the democratic cooperative economic order that will forever prevent war and poverty. MODERN PROPHECY (From the New York Post) "Secretary of Agriculture Henry A. Wallace stood before an audience largely composed of wealthy men at the Union League last night and warned them that they and their .kind must change their ways if economic and social change is to be avoided." "In 1929," he said, "36,000 families at the top of the wealth structure received as much income as 11,000,000 families at the bottom." "Upon these 36,000 families resolves the task of avoiding the errors of the Bourbons of France." "Otherwise," he said, "there'will come a day when the pyramid will be inverted and there will be a great shifting of the blocks with accompanying woe and, anguish while the new pyramid is being formed." WHO ARE THE WISE? Starr King says, "The chief 'difference between a wise man and an ignorant one is, not that the first is acquainted with re gions invisible to the second, away frrom common sight and interest, but that he understands the common things which the second only sees." ,• ..= i;j., The question might well be asked, when the workers can see and act cooperatively to solve the distress that is all around them, and the professors and journalists and preachers generally cannot do so, then who are the spiritual and wise ro£> the earth? Most so-called leaders are. dealing with misty vagaries while .the- common people build .the solution in icooperative organization. ., I have been in towns where a coopéra* tive has been organized and the preachers and professors had no appreciation of its significance as being the beginning of. the recovery of ownership by the people of that community of their farms and homes and businesses and banks, and in a few cases did not even Jknow the coopera tive existed. One man whom I asked as to whether there was a cooperative oil station there, answered that there was a "farmers" oil station but he didn't know of any cooperative. It's high time for preachers to inspire and for professors to inform the people about .this simple democratic solution if they are to continue to be supported as leaders—otherwise they should give way to those who will really lead out and fight the battles for the people. INNOCENTS AT HOME One cannot but wonder at .the inno cence of the American people. We have existed by the use of excessive credit fol lowed by deflation for tlhe last twenty years and now we are at it again as though we had learned nothing from ex-' ' perience. First we loaned billions to Europe and put war bonds in the Treas ury of the United States. A Commission headed by President Hutchins of Chicago University reports that we might as well be "realistic" and "take what we can get" which will be near nothing. Then we. re financed Europe after the war and bought the bonds privately and put them in our safety deposit boxes. These bonds are also included in the recommendation of the Commission as being worth' only "what we can get." Yet now we are on the third great credit spree and unwilling ;)0 to face the issue. President Roosevelt > •• estimates an increase in the public debt to thirty-one billion dollars in 1935 and thirty-five billion dollars in 1936-and yet says "I do'not consider it advisable at this time to propose any new or additional taxes for the fiscal year 1936," and then . declares that these loans