"The distinguishing and most important feature in our plan, is that which gives the annual prize-holders the right of selecting their prizes from among the productions of American Art in any part of the United States. This plan was adopted as the one which would best secure the object for which we have been incorporated, viz., "The Promotion of the Arts of Design in the United States." It is evident that the distribution of fifty prize certificates among our members, as was the case at our last annual distribution, with which the prize-holders themselves could purchase their own pictures any where in the United States, is preferable to any plan which empowers a committee, composed of a limited number of managers, with the entire right to control the funds involved in the purchase, and make the selection of such a number of pictures. In the one case, individual taste, and local predilection for some particular style of art, or certain class of artists, may influence the decision of a mere picture-buying committee in the selection and purchase of the whole number of the prizes; but in the other case, the various taste of a large number of prize-holders, residing in different sections of our vast country, is made to bear upon Art, and, consequently, there must ensue a diffusion of knowledge upon a subject wherein those persons themselves are the interested parties. Should a subscriber to the Art-Union of Philadelphia, residing in St. Louis, be allotted a prize certificate of one hundred dollars, he has the option to order or select his picture in that city, and thereby encourage the Fine Arts at home, just the same as if that Art-Union were located where he lived, and with just as much advantage to the artist as though it were the result of that progress in art, in his vicinity, which should cause the production of such a picture. And there can be no doubt of the judicious selection on the part of such a subscriber. No man with a hundred dollars to spend for a picture, would be likely to make such a purchase without having some knowledge on the subject himself, or without consulting persons of acknowledged taste in the matter; thereby insuring more general satisfaction to all concerned, than would a picture of the same value awarded by chance from the selection of a committee located in another part of the country. No committee, no matter how great its judgment, or how well performed its duties, could effect a more satisfactory arrangement; for in our case the prize-holder and the artist are the contracting parties, without the intervention of the Art-Union, or the payment of any commission on either side. Another argument in favor of the Art-Union of