The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, March 10, 1919, Page 13

e < . gressive members of the senate as- . ¢ Hoover’s OpiniOns on the Beef Trust Letter to President From Food Administrator Written Six Months .Agé Just Made Public—Ignores Facts Well Established by Trade Commission Washington Bureau, ; Nonpartisan Leader INCE Francis J. Heney has def- initely proved that Food Ad- ministrator Hoover refused to dismiss Swift’s man Priebe as head of the poultry division of the food administration, after Priebe had been shown to have misused his powers as a govern- ment official while drawing a big salary from a Swift concern, Hoo- ver has grown anxious to “get right” with the American public. And since a number of the pro- sailed Hoover as a friend and protector of the Big Five pack- ers, in the debate on the $100,- 000,000 appropriation to feed the hungry in certain parts of Europe, Hoover has decided to reply to these charges. Hence ‘the announcement from Hoover’s office on Feb- ruary 19 that President Wil- son had consented to the publication of a letter. on . the federal trade commission’s report on the pack- ing industry, which Hoover wrote under date of September 11, 1918. This Hoover letter, written five weeks after the report of the commission was made public through- out the country, starts out with a few brave words about possible food monopoly, then defends the packers’ growth, throws up embankments of doubt as to whether various rémedies are work'able, and ends by apfiroving a parf of the commission’s plan for curbing the food monopolists. Then, appar- ently in order to justify his lack of enthusiasm for the commission’s disclosure of the rottenness of the packing combine, Hoover suggests “consider- ation” of the possible limitation of the packers to those industries directly related to meat and meat " animal products. ADMITS SOME DANGER “I scarcely need to repeat,” he begins, “the views I expressed to you nearly a year ago, that there is here a growing and dangerous domination of the-handling of the nation’s foodstuffs.” Fine! But what next? “I do not feel that appreciation of this domina- tion of necessity implies wrongdoing on the part of the proprietors (of the five chief packing con- cerns), but is the natural outgrowth of various factors which need correction.” That is Hoover’s lofty view of the damning facts as to lawlessness on the part of the Swifts, Ar- mours, Morrises and their associates, for whom no law was saered and no government had al- legiance due as against their profits. Hoover" couldn’t find a rich lawbreaker in Chicago five weeks after the report of the federal commis- - sion was printed and a year after the public hear- ings with reference to their guilt had begun. He then gives a long account of the growth of the stock car and refrigerator car and stockyards control held by the Big Five. “Thus,” he remarks in- passing, “the pro- vision of a large part of the stockyards and car services has naturally fallen in consider- able degree to the larger and more wealthy packers who have used their advantages as in effect a special and exclusive railway privilege with which to build up their own business.” Also: “Their excellence of organization, the standing of their brands, and control of facilities now_ threaten even further inroads against inde- pendent manufacturers and -wholesalers -of other food products. They now vend scores of aiticles, and this constantly increasing list now approaches a dominating proportion of the interstate business in several different food lines.” Nice, smooth language, and Hoover ought to- know, because he had a group of the cleverest . high-salaried men from the big packers’ staff, right in his own organization, and he had pro- : .tested to President Wilson when Heney showed them up and tried to drive them out into the open. lines controlled by the packers; yet of Hoover’s poultry price-fixing division, and Swift and Armour lost not a penny by it. “It is a matter of great conten- tion,” says the neutral Hoover, “as to whether these five firms compete amongst themselves, and the records of our courts and public bodies are - monuments to this conten- tion.” with this one. ice. s Mind you, this was Hoo- ver in the fall of 1918, when every school boy knew the story of the Veeder pool percentages on which the packers divided among themselves the empire of American livestock! On the next page of his letter Hoover admits that the Big Five “must naturally Poultry was one of these food X ' Priebe of Swift’s con- cern stayed in charge —Drawn expressly for the Leader by Congressman John M. Baer . Here is the big American Question Mark as League congressman John M. Baer sees it. All other questions are small in comparison Some of the agents between the consumer and the . farmer are unnecessary; others are charging too much for their serv- The consumer’s income will not sustain the system. politicians have no answer to this question except the one offered by Taft, “God knows.” The story on this page giving further revela- tions on the packing trust, shows where a lot of the pros- farmers is going. A perity qf the consumers and the : PAGE THIRTEEN 1708 /‘;/{j[;v'//(‘/’//, / i [ 0.0a%,, W) refrain from persistent, sharp, competitive action toward one another,” and that “it is practically inconceivable that any new firms can rise to their class, and in any event even sharp competition be- tween the few can only tend to reduce the number of five and not increase it.” He admits also that “the narrow number of buyers undoubtedly produces an unstable market which reacts to discourage production.” The federal trade com- mission and Francis J. Heney have shown not only that the Big Five control and manipulate the livestock market in a way that discourages production, but that the actual operations of the pack- ers in the packing industry are so loaded down with charges and special expenses due to their - habit of monopoly, that there is * no economy in their big l production. The consum- T S er is worse off because 4 they have grown sq big. J. Ogden. Armour ad- mitted this point. What does Hoover say? “It can be contended, I believe,” he tells the president, “that those concerns have developed ‘great eco- nomic efficiency; that their costs of manufacture and . profits are made from the wastes of 40 years ago. UNAWARE OF REPRESSIVE ACTS “The- problem we have to consider, however, is thé ultimate social result of-the expanding domination, and whether it can be réplaced by a system of better social character, and of equal economic efficiency for the present and of greater- promise for ). " 1 these businesses have been economically ef- ficient in their period of competitive growth, but as time goes on this efficiency can not fail to di- minish and, like all monopolies, begin to defend itself by repression rather than by efficiency.” That last phrase indicates only one thing—that Hoover wishes the”president to.believe that the Big Five packers have not been repressive, but have been economically efficient, thus far! Hoover, forced to declare himself on the com- mission’s definite program, says he favors the tak- ing over by the government, or under its control, of the stock cars and refrigerator cars; later on he shows doubt of the wisdom of public operation ° of these car lines. P On the stockyards question, he agrees that the packers should "again is not clearly for gov- ernment’ operation. As for the branch houses, Hoover uses a lot of words to wrap up his hostility to the notion that the public should own and operaté these whole- sale storage places for meat. He mentions in this connection “discussion with the independent packers” as a basis of his oppo- sition, and this recalls the dis- closure made before the senate the packers secretly - named, through one of their secretly paid agents, the independent packers who were sent to advise the food administrator. Hoover finds the Big Five packers doing. 1o’ wrong, yet . their business is “a growing and ' dangerous domination” of Amer- ica’s food supply. ~ Heney once told Hoover: “I don’t question your in- tegrity one iota, but I do question your point of view, not only in this matter but <in others.” The old the future. It is certain, to my mind, that - _mnot comtrol the yards, but’ committee on agriculture that - LR - ¥ SE AR, Sy SN W AT ET AN e ¥ i