The Co-opolitan: A Story of the Co-operative Commonwealth of Idaho

by Zebina Forbush

Caroline made her application the next day. Being neither a citizen of Idaho nor a member of the Brotherhood, she was obliged to pass an examination as to health, opinions and wealth. The first was found to be perfect. The second showed her to be fully acquainted with co-operative principles and the main features of our peculiar system. Wealth she had none. But she had what was better than wealth. She had talent. She had education. She had some experience in teaching and was a skillful stenographer. She was accepted and enrolled in the Educational department. This was in June and her services were not required until September in that department. She was, however, placed on the pay roll and given her vacation period at once. It did not concern the department whether her school year began or closed with a season of rest. I, too, was entitled to a vacation of four weeks each year and it was usual for me to take it in July or August. Ordinarily I spent it in the vicinity of the great lakes in the northern part of the state or with parties of excursionists in the mountains. This year I designed to visit New England and to take with me my wife. Caroline was agreeable to this plan and I made all arrangements accordingly.

In the latter part of June we were married and on the very same day, as a part of the celebration, the work of putting the new novel into type was begun. It was a joyful occasion. The wedding ceremony was performed at my house in Co-opolis and Governor Thompson did me the honor to officiate. It was not a public affair. Members of the Legislative Council, Governor Thompson and the members of my departmental staff and their wives were present at the wedding feast, which was spread at the Co-opolitan Hotel. That evening my wife and I took a special car at 11:30 o’clock on the Co-opolis Southern Electric Railroad for Boise City, from which place we went to Nampa, met the early morning east-bound train on the Union Pacific and proceeded on our wedding trip.

We were absent until the middle of August and were glad enough to return. I say we were glad to return, but this does not mean that our trip was unpleasant. We were like people of refinement who gayly abandon the luxurious surroundings of a beautiful Christian home and, returning to the primitive habits of their savage ancestry, descend, for a short season, to the novelty of camp life. However enjoyable such life may seem for a season there comes a time, and that speedily, when the novelty wears off, and life in the civilized world is all the more pleasurable by comparison. So you descend into the regions of commercial competition; the waste regions and desert lands of speculation; the world where old men and women are left to die in poverty after a life of usefulness; where little children, innocent of wrong, are trained daily to sin, or are starved to death in sight of plenty. We were glad to return to Co-opolis and take up our labors in a land where we could not hope to acquire more of the world’s good than we could use, but where we could be sure that we and ours would not be compelled to try subsistence on less than we needed, and where every human being was guaranteed “the inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

CHAPTER XVII.
THE UNITED STATES CONVEYS PUBLIC LAND TO THE STATES—THE CO-OPOLITAN ASSOCIATION RECLAIMS THE SNAKE RIVER VALLEY—A GREAT AND BENEFICENT ENTERPRISE.

The year 1905 witnessed the inauguration of two important enterprises in Idaho, each of which has contributed immeasurably to the development of the Co-operative Commonwealth. Both were proposed, superintended and owned by the Co-opolitan Association. The first was the irrigation, cultivation and settlement of the Snake River Valley. This valley at that time was noted for its wonderful scenery, its broad expanse of uncultivated and unoccupied land, and the majestic river which swept swiftly through it. All public lands belonging to the United States had, the year before, been granted to the various states in which they were situated, each state being required to pay two cents an acre to the Federal government therefor. Some of the states proceeded to pay at once and receive the patent for the lands so granted, and to dispose of the same to settlers.

Among those which paid for their acquisitions promptly was Idaho. But the money to pay, amounting to one million three hundred and eighty-six thousand dollars, was advanced to Idaho by the Co-opolitan Association. This advance, let it be understood, was not a loan. The state government could not borrow money. But the Co-opolitan Association had become so powerful and exercised such entire and absolute control over the state government that when it advanced this amount it was well understood that it was able to reimburse itself at will. The state now acquired the public lands of the Federal government, but was powerless to improve them. What should be done?

The Great Council had met during the first half of the year, and its members were all Co-opolitans except eleven. It realized that it would be open to severe criticism outside of the state if it should grant the newly acquired lands to the Co-opolitan Association, whether for a consideration or gratuitously. It did not concern Idaho what the world beyond its territory thought, except that we were all anxious that mankind, for its own good, should not be misled as to the benefits of co-operation. Before that session of the Great Council was closed a petition, signed by more than twenty per cent of the voters of the state, was submitted to the Governor, on the recommendation of the Great Council itself, asking that the simple question of whether the public lands of the state should be granted in fee simple absolute to the Co-opolitan Association on condition that the Association improve the same, be submitted to popular vote at the October election. Under our law it was the duty of the Governor, if such petition was properly signed, to submit the question proposed as a matter of course, and it was done accordingly.

This was not the first time the people had by petition initiated legislation, but it was the most important question thus far submitted. There was no doubt as to the result, because the Co-opolitan Association embraced nearly all the people of the state except something like fifty thousand who were scattered along the boundaries of Montana and Wyoming, being principally placer miners and cattle men. Even among these there were many inclined to favor the grant. But the question was very fully discussed. The Daily Co-opolitan, under my charge, presented the arguments on all sides. Every company in the Industrial Army was required to attend at least three meetings before election day, at which the question was debated by the ablest debaters we could find, and on election day it is safe to say that the voters who were ignorant of the merits of this question were exceedingly few. The election resulted in a vote of two hundred and sixteen thousand five hundred and three for and seven thousand three hundred and twenty against the grant. The decision of the people thus registered was the law of the state and was sufficient in itself to pass the title in all this land to the Association, but the formality of issuing the patent was enacted when the Great Council met the following January.

Great were the preparations the day after election for the work of reclaiming the Snake River Valley. The Legislative Council was in constant session arranging the details of an industrial occupation of a new and broader domain. The Engineering department had long before procured complete surveys of all the public lands, and more especially of this valley. A final survey had been made for an extensive system of irrigation flumes, canals and ditches, together with reservoirs for the collection and storage of surface waters, as well as the waters diverted from the river. Four thousand men were dispatched, under the charge of the proper departments, to commence the work and make excavations along the survey at such points as they could work most conveniently, and when the freezing of the ground in the latter part of November made further work in that direction impracticable the army returned to Co-opolis and the companies composing it were sent to their several home cities and engaged in other employment.

When springtime came—the spring of 1906—the work upon the irrigating system of Snake River Valley was again resumed with an increased force. It was prosecuted with such vigor that when the snow began to fly again the whole system was completed and constituted the most extensive of the kind on the American continent. The result was that one million acres of land as fertile as any in the world, not excepting the valley of the Nile, were made available for use for agricultural purposes and all of this was the property of the Co-opolitan Association. The whole of this broad area was now turned over to the Agricultural department. The Transportation department was also instructed to extend the Co-opolis Southern Electric Railroad the entire length of the valley, and in two years from the time the first work was done on the irrigating system that marvelous region was changed from a wilderness into a productive and beautiful garden.