210 
AGRICULTURAL RELIEF 
“YWhat are you going to do with your tobacco?” The grower would 
say, “I belong to the cooperative association; I am going to deliver 
my tobacco to the association.” ‘Oh, yes; and get it all tied up, 
and you will not know when you will get your money. I don’t believe 
I want to loan you. Of course, if you are gong to sell all your tobacco, 
I would be very glad to loan you the money you want.” 
As a result that man went home without his loan. He was in need 
and got to thinking about how to obtain relief, and the first thing we 
knew they got to bootlegging their tobacco; and they even tell the 
story that they have mules down in that country that can not haul 
now except at night. [Laughter] 
As a result, the third year the association received very little 
tobacco. 
The next year came along and there was a shorter crop but a 
better quality crop, and the buyer went out and announced, ‘‘Here 
is a short crop; here is where you have a chance for fine prices’; 
and they even went out and paid some fancy prices for the 1925 
crop, just to show what they were willing to do about it. As a 
result there were meetings held all over the districts, and the farmers 
passed resolutions urging us not to operate that year, saying buyers 
had declared they were all going to pay a fair price, and that growers 
wanted all their money at once. They were in need. 
The directors saw the situation. So they passed a resolution 
stating that for the 1925 crop they believed that the members should 
stand by their contract and deliver, but that if they failed to do so 
they would not enforce the damage clause through the courts, 
believing it to be too expensive and not practicable to do it if so 
many were violating their contracts. 
Mr. CLarke. What is the penalty? 
Mr. MorGan. The penalty is 5 cents a pound. The. result was 
that no tobacco was delivered that year. The market opened and, 
instead of the price being what they expected—around 18 cents— 
it opened up around 12 cents for this short crop; and it started 
dropping, and the records showed it dropped each week clear down 
to the end, and finally, instead of being around 14 or 15 cents that 
the association had maintained for those three big crops, which were 
not as good in quality, the average for that season was a little better 
than 6 cents a pound for that crop of tobacco. 
Mr. Mences. Did that convert you fellows to the cooperatives? 
Mr. Morean. It did. But still there was the outsider who 
refused to come in, and that kept the membership discouraged. 
Then l a result in that year’s crop was $9,700,000 to that district. 
ers ex year they started to rejoin, and they held voluntary meet- 
1gs all over the district, and new members began to come into the 
A 2d then we began to be harassed with lawsuits, and 
col Sy os rom every angle with injunctions, with suits for re- 
Pointe ev ery other method known to the courts at all different 
Joining Lh SADT to ombarass us and discourage those people from 
ir Siar, Ths Oe po of hose suet 
ot hose suits was they said that we had 
ot operated for the 1925 crop, and theref i hould b 
appointed to wind up the affairs of ut Tg go 
out 118 Fall etmieont affairs of the association for not carrying