The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, October 7, 1918, Page 10

K operated, is told in the follow- S 357561 89723 44689 A 29266 32518 36582 M 14983 16648 18729 C 10 1111 S&810 v v : 100000 100000 100000 : indicate. In the first place, this- " letter, as well as many other" - documents to be produced here- -+ after, shows that Henry Veeder, i the ‘agent of the former con- / spiracies, is still acting as the X ~joint agent for the Big Fiveand . ; : 3 _the custodian of their agree- Leader Cartoonist W. C. The su tion especiall Washington part of the money was paid and for what purpose. At least two separate pools of this character are participated in by the big packers: First, “The Packers’ Pool,” limited in membership to the Big Five; and, second, “The Oleo Pool,” the mem- bership of which varies from year to year, but al- ways includes Armour and Swift. The Oleo Pool is composed of large manufactur- ers of oleomargarine, butterine and other similar products, who are pledged to divide whatever as- sessments may be determined upon for their joint purposes on the basis of their proportionate pro- duction of oleomargarine during the preceding year. In 1917, for example, the membership of the Oleo Pool and the percentages used in collect- ing the joint funds were as follows: ; X Per cent A. (Armour & Co.).vununivunnnnnnnn. 12,387 F. (Friedman Manufacturing company) 6.246 J. (John F. Jelke company).......... 32.172 M. (Morris & Co.).......u..... oo 10.481 ~W.J. M. (W. J. Moxley, Inc.)......... 11.5668 W. (Wilson & Co., Inc.).............. 4.266 H. (G. H. Hammond company)........ 8.652 S. (Swift & Co.).......... ceeeseeeee. 19.234 The general character and purposes of the Oleo Pool are disclosed by the following extract from a letter written by Alfred R. Urion, former gen- eral counsel for Armour & Co., to Henry Veeder: I give you the following information to be disseminated amongst those who are associated with us in Pennsylvania oleomargarine. The source of my report you are familiar with. I give you letter on the subject received Saturday: “Have been given positive assurance by the big man that there will not be any suits brought in_this state during the time named, on tinted goods, pro- vided they are not too yellow; that is to.say, you must not go to ex- tremes in color, but that the reg- ular run of tinted goods will be all right. The wholesalers and manufacturers should not go fai- ther in spreading the understand- ing than to simply notify their trade verbally that no suits will be brought and that there will be no trouble in their handling nat- ural tinted goods.” I have gone back to the party by letter and asked to get a definite statement from the big man, call- ‘- ing off the state agents from tak- ing samples and frightening the trade, and have no doubt will re- ceive a favorable answer thereto. The genesis of what we have called the Packers’ Pool, as well as the basis upon which it is ing letter from Henry Veeder to W. B. Traynor, assistant to Louis F. Swift: August 28, 1916. Mr. W. B. Traynor, Care Swift and Company, Chicago. Dear Sir: You asked me the other day for certain percentages which .are generally known as the " On July 80, 1918, L S, AMand T E W agreed with C and S & S upon the following percentages to cover general legislative and litigation matters: "Of course, C and S were arbi- trary. The A. F and H figures are the so-called old beef figures which . were upon the volume of beef business in 1902, 3 " Sincerely-yours, This letter and agreement contain a great deal more mean- ing than cursory reading would ‘ments. : - let” ~iThe: purpose of this'éqmbina,- 2 against menopoly, { tion, which for more than a - . . generation has ‘defied the law = Here is another chapter from the official re and the letters written by the packers the the farmers have for years been bringing a nopolists will b e only a memory like th * The farmer here has ! and escaped adequate punishments, are sufficient- ly clear from the history of the conspiracy and from the numerous documents already . presented namely: To monopolize and divide among the several in- terests the distribution of the food supply not only i . of the United States but of all countries which produce a food surplus, and, as a result of this monopolistic position, To extort excessive profits from the people not only of the United States but of a large part of the world. To secure these ends the combination and its constituent members employ practically every tried method of unfair competition known to this com- mission and invent certain new and ruthless meth-" ods to crush weaker concerns. SHORT WEIGHTS PART OF PACKER EFFICIENCY T The early strength and rapid growth of the Big Five was stimulated by the extortion of. rebates under one disguise or another and special privileges. Among other well-known methods of unfair com- petition used by the big packers of which the com- mission has evidence may be mentioned the fol- lowing: Bogus independents. Local price discriminations. Shortweighting. ) Acquiring stock in competing companies. In addition to these recognized methods of un- A FIND IN 1930 PasR Mo LiST { KNEW HiM lowed up of kulls “of port of the federal trade commission on the packing trust. The further ‘we read in the commission’s report, the stronger is the webof damning proof woven around these industrial 'bnga.nds. ‘ rised burglar, of course, hates the policeman. By means of sworn testimony, market reports of various kinds mselves, there is absolute substantiation in this report of the charges which gainst them.- At last we have a full, authoritative report of an investiga- ordered by the president and intrusted to men in whom he had confidence. ad prevented a real investigation of the packers. Failing at last the big special interests are now trying to discredit the commission, but the farmers are resolved that this last desperate trick shall fail also. Morris has here taken a good idea from Shakespeare’s “Ham- After the organized farmers and ‘working people of the cities have won their fight we will quickly .get. back to healthy, free American life and the mo- e old robber barons or the slave traders. 0 ulls of the extinct species, - For two years lobbyists in fair competition the Big Five also employ a vicious system of rotation in price-cutting. This consists in each of the Big Five, or as many as happen ‘to be represented-in a given territory, arranging to cut prices in rotation, a day at a time or a week at a time, so that the burden, distributed among the big packers, will seem light, but will fall with crushing weight on the independent competitor. These. big packers who aim at world monopoly persistently stoop to the commonest of commercial frauds—shortweighting. = They shortweight the livestock producers in the sale of grain and hay at the stockyards; they shortweight the retailers on their shipments of meat; they shortweight the gov- ernment; and, to make a complete job of it, they shortweight one another. Here is an amusing ex- ample of the last-named practice in the form of an -extract from-a letter written July 6,-1917, by Ar- mour’s Neenah Cheese & Cold Storage company to its Mineral Point (Wis.) branch, giving instruc- tions with reference to Cudahy’s demand for a weighmaster’s certificate on his order: ML Now if you have not an official ‘weighmaster, get some fellow that looks like one and furnish him with blanks if necessary yourself. It is ha: necessary to him make a test on each lot. You reillia hll\‘v‘ev: few rrange to cheese sitting- around for him to weigh that are not going How considerably this practice of shortweight- . ing may affect the retajl price of -meats appears from a single example,’ selected at random from several tests made in the presence of the com- mission’s agents: ; BARREL OF PORK BUTTS FROM ARMOUR & CO. 5 Weight in' pounds Marked I Actual Gross veveeeeeass 287 - 284 TAYe. Jooesessens 21 29 Net “iooeiiianss 266 258 Here were 11 pounds of pork which the retailer “is forced to pay for because 'of the inflexible ! rule of the big packers that stamped weights under penalty of having: credit cut off. The cost of these 11 pounds had to be distributed in some way over the sellimp price of the remain- der and collected from the con- . sumer. S Foremost of packer practices- in evil results is the manipula- tion of the livestock markets, manifested primarily in violent and unreasonable fluctuations in’ livestock prices fromlday to day. This constitutes -the -greatest’ grievance of the livestock pro- the markets. How seriously these. market fluctuations are is expressed in the - following - tional Livestock: association:: in the Fob corn belt “has become the: hazardous “and - uncertain gnznge in. “Outside of gambling on . . York Stock exchange, I know of nothing to compare” with it. .. B " Probably the worst thing the . feeder has to eontend with 48 _these: . violent fluctuations.” The plausible contention is”made by the packers that the rapid advances are an off- 8et to the declines, but such’is far - a8 fully three-quar- from the case, as shipments must be accepted at ducers against packer control of regarded by livestock producers = - statement of E. L. Burke, vice = president of the AmeticanflN_a-_. e The fact is that beef production . legitimate business that'a man can.. TR he board of trade or ‘the' New '