1893 - State Library Information Center

APPENDIX III.Building and Loan Association League*PBBMIUM PLANS *la the consideration of any subject I think it is advisable tostate at the opening the point of view from which the subject isregarded, and to specify, as briefly as may be, the underlyingprinciples which we are to follow.In considering premium plans for building and loan asBocia-itions of the State of New Jersey, I assume that the associationswhose representatives I am addresesing all desire to work in thespirit as well as the letter of the laws from which we derive ourprotection and our authority to do business. All of these laws,supplements and amendments, constantly refer to these associationsas mutual or cooperative societies, and it is from a mutualor cooperative standpoint that I wish to discuss these premiumplans. The past Legislatures have been almost too liberal in encouragingthis class of mutual work, being, apparently, veryanxious to help those who help themselves by helping others tohelp themselves.I have no reference to those private concerns largely advertisedas loan associations, or as societies based on building and loanideas, who come in under the too liberal features of the laws, butwhich consist usually of but one or two active persons as managers,with enough dummies to comply with legal requirements,and who organize solely as a money-making scheme for theirown personal benefit. Nor have I any reference to the so-called* Paper by Alex. Christie, of the Bayonne Building Association, read at the annual meetingof the State League, Trenton, January, 1804.30 (449)