But I maintain that conditions, circumstances and a great nation of intelligent, honest, industrious and comparatively temperate laboring men and women made their work possible in America when it could not have been successful in any other country in this world. I do not say this from motives of patriotism. I say it because it appears to me that the reasons to support the allegation will be recognized and approved when stated. In the first place, there has never before been any extensive experiment with industrial co-operation for the benefit of the workers engaged in it, where land was the basis of all operations, except in ancient Peru. It is unfortunate that history has been so far deprived of the records of that wonderful country, by the destructive fanaticism of its Spanish conquerors, that the details of its system must remain obscure. But happily the indisputable fact remains to give courage to co-operators who do battle in the dark corners of the world that Peru was a co-operative or socialistic state, and that its people were happy, prosperous and contented. This fact suggests the very pertinent question whether the people who boast a high state of civilization like that of modern New York and Boston are equal to the establishment of a system as just, as fair and as equitable in the production, distribution and protection of wealth as the comparatively ignorant, simple-minded and uncivilized inhabitants of ancient Peru? The example of Idaho proves that we are. But in England, France and Germany the co-operators have confined their undertakings almost exclusively to manufactures and distribution. The land has rarely entered into their calculations, or when it has been considered has never been regarded as available. In Idaho we have made land the chief feature of our enterprise, and I maintain and, in fact, know, that we could never have succeeded in any marked degree if we had not done so. A commonwealth which has not the title to its own land is like a house suspended in the air. Even the co-operative societies engaged in manufacture and distribution manufacture and distribute what comes, primarily, from the land. When they receive the raw material to manufacture or distribute it has been handled by a number of traders, brokers and other middlemen and its price increased oppressively. We avoided all this by owning the land. In England and other densely populated countries the rich land has all been taken and the owner, whether lord or peasant, will not part with it except for a large sum of money. The co-operator is thus excluded, in those countries, from the use of land. It costs him nearly as much in spot cash to acquire it as the brokers and traders take from him, through a series of years, in profits on the raw product of land. Now in Idaho land was cheap, and cheap land is the co-operator’s salvation.