their common problems, to coordinate their business activities, to promote the development of consumers' cooperation in Cuyahoga County and vicinity and the establishment of new cooperatives, to coordinate the investigative activities of the member organizations. The federation shall at all times work in close cooperation with the Central States Cooperative League and the Cooperative Wholesale, Inc., of Chicago."

Any organization in the county or vicinity, adhering to Rochdale principles of consumers' cooperation, is eligible for membership.

The federation is controlled by a council of delegates from member organizations, but the council's actions are subject to review and veto by the board of directors of the Central States Cooperative League. Delegates are selected annually by the member organizations on the basis of membership as follows: One for memberships of 50 or less, two for 51 to 150, three for 151 to 650, four for 651 to 1,150, etc. Each delegate has one vote, and there is no voting by proxy. The league is entitled to one delegate, but without vote.

The officers a president, secretary, and treasurer-are elected once a year from among the membership of the council. An annual meeting is held in March, and special meetings are called as necessary. The expenses of the federation, largely for education and publicity, are met by the payment of annual dues of $1 by member organizations for each delegate representing them in the council, by assistance from the Central States Cooperative League, and other sources. One source of funds is the compensation paid by cooperative insurance companies in accordance with the number and value of policies written by accredited agents from among the federation members.

The federation has three standing committees, for education, investigation, and business. The education committee seeks to acquaint members and the general public with the principles and practices of consumer cooperation and to promote the organization of new groups. It works through five subcommittees: Cooperative education and publicity, which furnishes speakers to interested groups, distributing literature, etc.; labor, which contacts trade-unions and other labor groups; youth; women; and churches. The last three subcommittees have not yet begun active work.

The investigation committee is set up to look into working conditions under which goods are produced for cooperatives and the standards (quality, purity, suitability, weight, etc.) of goods or services handled by local cooperatives. Examples of the reports issued by this committee are one on coal and one on the dairy products handled by the companies with which the individual groups have buying agreements.

The management and coordination of such of the business activities as it is feasible to handle jointly is the purpose of the business com

mittee. Its five subcommittees each deal with a particular service, as follows:

(1) Joint purchasing of supplies for member groups which are still buying clubs and of commodities not handled by the cooperative stores.

(2) Arranging for purchases of coal from the Community Coal Co., and directing the efforts of the federation toward making this company again a consumers' cooperative.

(3) Carrying out the federation's agreement regarding cooperative insurance. Under this arrangement the federation receives from the three cooperative insurance companies affiliated with it what amounts to a commission on policies written for federation members. In return, the federation agrees to render certain services of an advertising and reporting nature, such as advertising space in its publications, assistance in the reporting of claims, information relative to the desirability of risks, recommendation of qualified persons to act as agents, etc. The service fee is used by the federation for educational purposes only.

(4) Surveying the possibilities of medical and dental care on a cooperative basis.

(5) Investigating the possibilities of cooperative housing in Cleveland.

The federation plans the establishment of a downtown store in the fall of 1937. A location had not been chosen at the time of the study nor had plans for financing been definitely drawn. It is probable that shares of stock or certificates of indebtedness will be sold to individuals through the member organizations. The downtown store will not compete with stores or other business outlets run by the member groups, but will serve as a general clearing house and display center. Sales will be credited to the organization to which the individual purchaser belongs. Samples of some goods, such as electrical appliances, clothing, cosmetics, etc., on which turn-over is small or which are not handled in the neighborhood stores or supply rooms could be displayed there and orders taken. A book department is also planned, to serve the students of colleges and universities in the Greater Cleveland area. None of these schools has a student cooperative at present and as it is known that there is a large margin between the purchase and resale price of second-hand books by private dealers, it is felt that such a department could provide real savings for members.

Other Affiliations of Cleveland Associations

The bylaws of the Greater Cleveland Cooperative Federation provide that in order to remain a member "all cooperatives shall become members of the Central States Cooperative League or the Ohio Farm Bureau Cooperative Association within a reasonable length of time

after joining the federation, as determined by the council." Most of the individual organizations have fulfilled this requirement, and the rest, whose business operations are only beginning to get under way, have signified their intention of doing so. The Cleveland Consumers' Cooperative Club owned shares of stock in Cooperative Distributors, Inc.-a mail-order cooperative in New York City-and with the formation of the federation, these shares were transferred to it. Thus the groups which belong to the Federation may purchase from Cooperative Distributors, or individual members may place their orders direct.

Relation to Organized Labor

Cleveland is a highly industrialized city and labor organizations have a strong hold there. The two older cooperatives in Cleveland draw their members largely from among industrial workers, and may be said to be definitely prolabor. The Slovenian stores, for instance, supplied food to workers from an automobile body plant who were on strike for 6 weeks in 1936, and the Community Coal Co. sells coal at cost to workers on strike. The leadership and the majority of members of the newer groups spring from the professional and business groups. Their sentiment, however, is also prolabor, as expressed in preference for union-label goods, requirements that there be good labor conditions in establishments in which their goods are made or with which they have buying agreements, and in efforts to bring more wage earners and trade-unionists into the movement.

A point of difference exists, however, between federation members and two other cooperatives-the Cleveland Cooperators, Inc., and the East Cleveland Cooperators, Inc. The member who was instrumental in organizing these two groups and who is president of both of them feels strongly that a cooperative organized on Rochdale principles must remain impartial on the subject of labor and especially that it should not go on record as favoring trade-unions. He fears the danger that the cooperative movement may be dominated by organized labor and coerced by it. Irked by what was felt to be the "dictatorial" attitude of federation officials on this point, these two associations have refused to join it, although their parent clubs, the Downtown and East Cleveland Clubs, respectively, are an affiliate and a member of the federation. Both groups have been excluded from membership in the Central States Cooperative League because they have not been endorsed by the federation, and because it is a rule of the league that local groups must be members of any existing city federation before they may join the regional organization. Although not a member of the league, the East Cleveland Cooperators, Inc., purchased more goods from The Cooperative Wholesale at Chicago in the first 4 months of 1937 than did any other cooperative in Cleveland.

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The stand of the Cleveland Cooperators, Inc., that if it opens a cafeteria or restaurant it will be an "open shop" as far as hired labor is concerned, has alienated other consumer cooperative groups which might have lent the project active support.

Many of the individual members of the two groups remaining outside the federation, however, do not subscribe to the views expressed above. Several, in fact, are trade-union leaders or sympathizers. Opinion was expressed, however, that the majority in the two associations could be won over to the federation's stand, so that all consumer cooperatives in Cleveland could work in harmony.

Continual efforts are being made to interest trade-unionists and labor organizations in the cooperative movement. A trade-union secretary who is a member of one of the cooperatives makes it a point to acquaint keymen in local labor circles with cooperative principles, the success of the movement in Europe and the recent gains in the United States, and to point out that cooperatives not only can save the members money but, through insistence on union-label goods, can be a force toward higher wages and better conditions. Discussions of the problem in meetings of trade-union locals is encouraged, and after further promotional work has been done, trade-unionists will be circularized to secure list of names of workers who are interested in joining one of the existing groups.

In Cleveland, as elsewhere, a certain element of suspicion and antagonism is apparent in the attitude of some unionists toward cooperatives. They would like to see the union label on more goods handled in cooperative stores, as it is their guaranty of fair wages and good conditions of work, and they feel obligated to purchase unionlabel goods wherever possible. Furthermore, they demand assurance that employees in cooperative establishments shall be paid the highest possible wages. There is the fear that these workers will be exploited and that money which should be paid toward wages will be diverted for patronage refunds.

Problems and Prospects

The problems which consumers' cooperation faces in Cleveland are probably common to similar urban organizations throughout the country. The heavy demands for credit which were made throughout the depression period of the last 8 years are lifting as business conditions improve and opportunities for employment are increasing. The granting of extensive credit was the cause of the failure of several cooperatives and of losses to those which survived the depression. During this period also many members requested refunds on their capital stock or on reserves which had been set up to their credit.

It is understandable that new cooperatives are anxious to create a business outlet through which to put into practice their theories of

retail selling. They thus have concrete evidence of cooperative enterprise to attract prospective members and to give their own members an interest in the movement which is hard to maintain merely through discussion and study groups. There has been some disagreement, however, among members of the two cooperatives which opened stores in October as to whether sufficient capital had been raised to see the stores through the difficulties of the early stages of business operation, and whether more complete surveys should not have been made among the members to determine the volume of patronage on which they could count, the commodities which should be stocked, etc. It is still too early to judge whether they acted too hastily in opening business outlets. Each of the newer groups names as its primary concern at present the problem of raising capital.

The establishment of a cooperative wholesale in the region has removed one of the obstacles which early cooperatives faced. The Workingmen's Cooperative, for instance, in its beginning years, had difficulty in securing credit from local grocery wholesalers. An early buying club among the Cleveland teachers was denied the privilege of trading with certain wholesalers when retail stores threatened to withdraw their orders from these middlemen. Only recently, an independent wholesaler bought back from one of the new cooperative groceries, at retail prices, the stock of goods he had sold to the store, because retailers in the neighborhood objected to the wholesaler furnishing a "co-op" with supplies.

Lacking sufficient capital to equip a complete store, the cooperatives usually start on a small scale and with a limited supply of goods. Members' residences are usually scattered throughout a large area, and housewives are often loath to go out of their way to make their purchases at the co-op when a completely stocked chain store or other grocery is just around the corner. The prospect of the deferred savings from patronage of the cooperative store often gives way before the pull of convenience and long-established purchasing habits.

There are prejudices or honest convictions to be overcome in securing new members or patrons. Many consider the cooperative development radical and subversive, and because of its rather close association with the labor movement, opponents of organized labor are likely to give it a wide berth. As pointed out above, many trade-unionists also are suspicious of the cooperators' motives, and are "waiting to be shown."

The two associations which have weathered the difficulties of a quarter of a century of operation each have, significantly, a close community of cultural interests and a common nationality and language. Their trading territory is small and their market established. Their members are drawn largely from among wage earners, and while they are distinctly interested in the social and economic