COOPERATION

Membership and Sales of Consumers' Cocperative Societies

TH

HE March, 1929, issue of Cooperation, periodical of the Cooperative League of the United States of America, contains a tabulation showing for 23 of the larger consumers' cooperative societies (20 retail associations and 3 wholesales) the sales, membership, and net gain for the years 1927 and 1928. These data are reproduced in the table below. As the table shows, all of the societies had sales of more than $100,000 during the year 1928, seven had sales of more than $500,000, and three had sales of a million dollars or more.

MEMBERSHIP AND BUSINESS OF CONSUMERS' COOPERATIVE SOCIETIES, 1927 AND

Development of the Credit-Union Movement in 1928

THE was mnt. This is to day perhaps the most rapidly

HE year 1928 was marked by a remarkable development in the credit-union movement.

increasing branch of the cooperative movement in the United States. Much of this growth, however, is due to the activities of the Credit Union National Extension Bureau, the National Service Relations Council of the Post Office Department, and the encouragement of some of the larger labor unions, such as the Brotherhood of Railway Clerks.

The 1928 issues of The Bridge (Boston) list 368 credit unions as having been established during that year. These are located, by States, as follows:

A report (Bul. No. 9) of the director of service relations in the Post Office Department states that from October 1, 1927, to December 31, 1928, the number of credit unions among employees in the Postal Service increased from 83 to 190, a gain of 107. During the same period the membership rose from 16,257 to 25,397, the assets from $1,001,535 to $1,770,952, and the loans granted from $3,183,890 to $6,329,736.

THE

LABOR CONGRESSES

Convention of Workers' Education Bureau, 1929

HE sixth national convention of the Workers' Education Bureau was held in Washington, D. C., April 5-7, 1929.

The opening session was addressed by William Green, president of the American Federation of Labor. He expressed the belief that a trade-unionist "is a stronger force for good if he is an educated trade-unionist." While it is desired that ideals be reached at once, human experience has shown that there is "no short cut to the millenium."

He referred to some "who would have us follow some other policy than that adopted by the American Federation of Labor in conventions assembled. Many of them are honest in their judgment, sincere in their protestations, and earnest in their enthusiastic endeavors to persuade the American Federation of Labor to follow some other course; but * * * we are not to be diverted from our fixed purpose to raise and advance, through practical, tried means and methods, the economic, social, and industrial interests of the workers of our great country."

Further on Mr. Green said:

"We are engaged in preserving our movement, not in tearing it down. We are not blind. We are endeavoring to understand the trend of the times, and while we concede to every institution the right to follow such academic policies as it may outline, we reserve to ourselves the right to withhold support, financially or otherwise, to an institution that would ridicule our philosophy, ignore it, and condemn its leaders, and thus undermine the confidence that the rank and file should have in those who lead them.

"Now, regarding education, I repeat again, if I may, that we are deeply interested in workers' education, and we do not want to restrict the workers in their examination of facts, but we want to carry to them every opportunity to equip themselves with the power of knowledge so they may succeed."

In closing his remarks Mr. Green expressed his sincere sympathy with the work of the convention and in the purposes and policies of the Workers' Education Bureau, pledging his support to that agency as follows:

So far as I am able to help it, it will be helped. So far as I am able to raise my voice in its behalf it will be raised. And on the other hand let no man deceive himself that when foes attack us, let them be professing friends or open foes coming in the light of day or the darkness of night, whether in sheep or wolf's clothing, the voice of the American Federation of Labor will be raised and we will strike back whenever we need to do so.

In the judgment of Mr. James H. Maurer, the president of the Workers' Education Bureau since its establishment in 1921, who spoke after Mr. Green, the function of workers' education is to

"rip free the dogmas and illusions which clutter up the social sciences in order to present to the workers an understanding of social life that will make possible an analytical survey of existing institutions." He held that for the last two years the workers' education movement has been losing ground. He attributed this in part to what he regarded as a denial by the American Federation of Labor that the fundamental purpose of such education was intelligent guidance to "a new social order. " 1

Referring to the exclusion of Brookwood Labor College from continued affiliation with the Workers' Education Bureau Mr. Maurer asserted:

If the workers' education movement, in convention assembled, will condone the suppression of one of its most successful and influential enterprises and not make effective protest to the labor movement, it may just as well fold up its tents and go home. There wouldn't be enough spirit left in the movement to keep it going for another year. 1

Report of the Executive Committee

ON THE AFTERNOON of April 5 the report of the bureau's executive committee was submitted. This report briefly records the progress of the American worker's education movement since the last biennial convention in 1927 and summarizes some of the problems faced by the movement during that period. According to this official document such record shows greater success "in the closer linking of the workers' education movement with the needs of wage earners."

Among the subjects discussed in the section on activities of the bureau are educational advice, field and district representatives, research, publications, cooperation of the public library, cooperative book service, registry of teachers and research work, and workers' loan library.

A topical summary is given below of that part of the report which deals with the general development of workers' education in the United States.

State federations of labor.-In 1927-28 there was less activity among State federations of labor in behalf of workers' education, due in part to the severe unemployment conditions in certain localities.

Of the States which in 1927 had educational directors, California, Colorado, Wyoming, and Pennsylvania remain. In the States of Colorado and Wyoming, however, the project for a joint director for both States suffered an interruption for a period of time with the result that the work which was being carried on has suffered. In the States of New Jersey, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Oregon, and the South, there have been provisions for local educational directors who are devoting part or all of their time to this activity whose respective work has been, in many ways, notable in character.

The State federations of labor of California, Oklahoma, and Wisconsin, the committee thinks, deserve special mention for their recent outstanding efforts in the cause of workers' education, special indorsement being given by the 1928 convention of the American Federation of Labor to the successful cooperative educational activities of the University of California and the federation of labor of that State.

The record of the past five years is a record of gratifying achievement. There has not been the slightest effort on the part of the university to exercise control New York Times, New York, Apr. 6, 1929, p. 16.

over the classes which have been started. There has been a full measure of cooperation on the part of the labor movement and the State in support of the plan. Paul Scharrenberg, secretary of the State federation, has authorized the statement that he is "fully satisfied with California plan, whereby we cooperate with the State university in labor education." The only criticism that has been raised has been the inability to arouse a larger number of workers in the State to the use of the facilities which have thus been provided.

Educational committees.—An increase is reported in the number of educational committees of central labor unions, of which there are now 270 as compared to 260 in 1927.

Labor forums.-Open labor forums have been held in the period under review by the Baltimore Labor College, the Denver Labor College, the New Haven Trades Council, and the Detroit Federation of Labor. A forum is to be established in Durham, N. C. In Ohio an ambitious plan for the development of forums has been formulated under the direction of the educational advisor of the federation of labor of that State.

Week-end conferences. Since its 1927 convention the bureau has record of the holding of 32 week-end labor conferences in various parts of the country, seven of these being called specifically for the discussion of unemployment while several others dealt with this problem in connection with some other important subject-for example, the 5-day week, the injunction, and social insurance.

Among other subjects taken up at these week-end conferences were: Old-age pensions, youth and the labor movement, new wage policy of the American Federation of Labor, poverty, workers' education, labor organization, the menace of the unorganized, the remedy for the textile industry, the newer relationships between capital and labor, trade-union psychology, and "Do savings cause depression?"

Labor institutes.-In the summer of 1927 there were three institutes at Brookwood College, one for the United Textile Workers, one for the women's auxiliaries to trade-unions, and a third to discuss the economics of the building industry.

A week's (evening) institute for the discussion of labor problems was arranged for by the educational director of the Wyoming Federation of Labor and held at Rock Spring.

In the summer of 1928 two additional labor institutes were carried on under the auspices of the Ladies' Auxiliary of the International Association of Machinists, one being conducted at Katonah, N. Y., and the other at Atlanta, Ga.

Labor chautauquas.-The labor chautauqua was first tried out in Pennsylvania coal-mining communities. În the summer of 1927 Mr. Paul W. Fuller directed two labor chautauquas, one in Passaic and the other in Paterson, N. J., the results of which are declared "sufficiently encouraging" to include such gatherings among the methods of stimulating the interest of wage earners in labor problems.

Workers' colleges and study classes.-The executive committee still holds to its conviction of two years ago that the important nucleus of the whole movement continues to be the local nonresident study class or workers' college. The committee confesses, however, that "it is impossible for anyone to state accurately how many study classes are in session in any one year."

The total aggregate number of groups of study classes about the country in all educational groups, however, will probably not be considerably under our