The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, May 16, 1921, Page 7

“hands of the Equity! change. This one bank extended but $60,000 credit, not enough to meet grain drafts of the Equity for half a day! The Equity was denied a seat on the chamber of commerce and its grain was not allowed to be shown in the sales room. When the Equity had foul grain to clean and sought the service of the terminal elevators, serv- ice was refused. The grain had to be sold “in the dirt” and when such sales occurred at prices, necessarily lower than if it had been cleaned, the cham- ber of commerce proclaimed that the Equity “couldn’t get the price.” The Equlty was forced, in order to sell on the Minneapolis market, to en- gage an agent who belonged to the chamber of commerce, and of course had to “split commissions” with him. Equity, grain was generally recognized as such and no member of the chamber of commerce would offer as much for Equity grain as for other grain of like quality. Hence, until .other outlets * were developed, Equity grain was sometimes sold below prices prevail- ing and whenever this was discovered the chamber agents in the country would hold it up as an instance of in- efficiency or fraud perpetrated by the Equity. A boycott was'declared against the Equity almost from the beginning of its operations. The first boycott cir- cular threatened expulsion from the chamber for any firm found handling grain for the Equity. The second threatened expulsion for any firm- found to have handled any grain that had ever at any time been in the Buyers were told that all grain consigned to the Equity was mortgaged. RAILROADS BROUGHT INTO CONSPIRACY Finally a master stroke of destruc- tion was gttempted against the farmer company. -On a day when the Equity had 70 carloads of grain on track in Minneapolis, a letter was received simultaneously from the principal railroads stating that they would not allow their cars to carry grain out of Minneapolis over any other road than their own. As the Equity was shut out -of the Minneapolis market by the boy- cott, this meant, for instance, that if the Equity had a market at some point ‘on the Milwaukee for a car of grain arriving over the Soo or Northern Pacific, this grain would have to be transferred from tHe Soo or Nprthern Pacific car to a Milwaukee car. It also meant extra sw1tchmg charges, elevator charges-for service, and de-. lay. But it meant something stijll more, sinister, which was quickly dis- covered. It meant that not a single elevator in aneapohs would transfer a car of grain for the Equity, for when the company sought to comply with this weird order of the railroads, it - found the terminal elevators Johnny- on-the-spot with a gleeful “No!”" . In this dire emergency the Equity appealed to Senator La Follette by telegram. La Follette acted. Com- missioner Marble of the interstate commerce commission wired theé-rail- roads and the orders were simultane- ously rescinded, never again to be re- peated. The Equity was saved. Greater success attended chamber of commerce efforts at preventing the farmer company from securing finance. Through its powerful banking connec- tions in Minneapolis it was able to prevent many country banks that wanted to be friendly and helpful from assisting, and this caused the Equity, in August, 1914;to move to St. Paul. But on top of other outrages of the grain trade against the farmers, sev- eral lawsuits were started against the Equity or those connected with it. The worst lawsuit of all was one started RJy. chamber of commerce in- terests in the district court at Fargo, N. D, in the fall of 1914 asking for dissolution of the company on grounds of insolvency. The case was formally brought by the attorney general of North Dakota, but attorneys for the chamber of commerce were the active prosecutors and of 200 witnesses call- ed by the state all admitted under cross-examination that they were em- ployes or members of the chamber of commerce. This suit resulted in the preposterous decision by the presiding judge that the Equity Co-Operative exchange, a North. Dakota corpora- tion, would have to submit all its books of account to an examination by the chamber of commerce of Minne- apolis! After months of untiring ef- fort to trump up something that would look like support for their claims of in- solvency, the chamber was unable to make such a showing, and the reaction .from this' persecution was the begin- ning of the splendid success of the Equity Co-Operative exchange. N = . ADVERTISEMENTS Work Shoe Sensation! AN ABSOLUTE $4.00 VALUE .39 SEND NO MONEY Limited Quantity—Order Quickly' ‘We want a thousand new customers at once, h this extra liberal offer. A splendid black. all leather work shoe (cost $2.92 to manufacture), made of specially tanned leather, with double sole and dirt-excluding bellows tongue. You have never been able to buy a better work shoe for the money, nat even before l.he war, Send no money. Just pa, the postman $2.35 plns pustage when they arrive. Then “examine them and if you don’t feel that they are worth $4.00, send them back and we will refund your money. You don’t risk a penny. Be sure t state size. 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