The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, July 25, 1921, Page 13

L r":committee, they were asked to resign. ° Taft and the Nonpartisan League New York Paper Finds His Prejudice Unfits- Him for HE Nation (New York), in its current issue, in discussing the appoint- ment of William Howard Taft to the supreme court of the United States, has the following to say re- garding Taft and the Nonpartisan league: “For the question is not the giving of a great position to a popular public man but whether that man is really intellectually equipped for an office which wields an enormous influence upon our national life and develop- ment—the supreme court, it must be remembered, has both legislative and judicial functions, although credited only with the latter. From this point of view we must regretfully record our belief that the choice of Mr. Taft is a grave mistake. It must be plain that what the position of chief justice called for in these rapidly changing - times, fraught with momentous issues, was far less a thick and thin supporter of the existing order than a man witlf broad vision and open mind; not a man long in political life and definitely committed to given political views, but one who ‘is at least not on record as having closed his mind on certain po- litical developments which may or may not come before him as chief justice for adjudication in one form or another, “Take, for instance, the questions arising out of the activities of the Nonpartisan league in North Dakota. Here is. what Mr, Taft had to say Supreme Justice about this new party in an address de- livered in this city on April 30: There has also been a combination of farm- ers, called the Nonpartisan league, originating in North Dakota and spreading to neighboring states. That is not a patriotic American party. It has been made possible by the insistence of a number of unsuccessful and in marny in- stances of foreign-born farmers in North Da- kota, who were aroused by a real grievance, as to grain classification and rates, and who conceived the idea that throuszh a political combination they could exclude every other class and every other interest and run the state for the farmers alone.. They adopted state socialism and proceeded to do state banking, state warehousing and pérforming all the other functions essential to the marketing of their crops by the state agencies. “Now, leaving aside the question as to whether Mr. Taft’s statement of facts as to the League is or is not cor- rect—the Nation’s readers will have their own opinions as to that—it must be perfectly plain that Mr. Taft will not be able to divest himself of an ac- quired prejudice in any case coming before him which may arise out of the activities of the League. . “But this is not the only case. In this same speech Mr. Taft came out against the initiative and the referen- dum in any general application, against the popular primary, and in favor of a convention system ‘safe- guarded against corruption.”’ As to the railroads, in a speech at Syracuse recently, Mr. Taft came out flat-foot- edly against anything approaching national ownership—curiously enough at the very moment when he had ac- cepted a retainer from the Canadian government to evaluate the privately owned railroads which the Canadian government is about to nationalize.” Retract Charges Disgruntled League Employes Take Back Statements About N. D. Committee EORGE TOTTEN JR. and C. K. Gummerson, who were for a brief period business manager and editor of the Fargo Courier-News,, the offi- cial daily paper of the Nonpartisan. league in North Dakota, have publicly retracted, in a signed statement, charges which they made against the committee of farmers elected at a referendum by North Dakota Leaguers to handle the affairs of the League in that state. Totten and Gummerson had charge of the Courier-News for a.short while when, their work not being satisfac- ory to a majority of the farmers’ Before quitting they attempted secret- ly to put out a special edition of the paper in which they had prepared for publication a charge that the state committee had mishandled and wasted the North Dakota recall defense fund, contributed by League members all over the country. They said the money was being spent by the committee for purposes other than that for which Leaguers contributed it. State Senator Liederbach, farmer of Dunn county, who, as chairman of the North Dakota League committee, is the head of the League work in the state, got notice about this proposed special edition in time to prevent the printing of all but a few copies, which fell in the hands of the League oppo- sition. The result has been that the newspapers of the country have been full of charges to the effect that the League has misused funds and that a fight within the League camp has “dis- rupted” the organization. The League committee immediately put the Courier-News in other hands .»and had Totten and Gummerson ar- o rested for criminal libel. The dis- gruntled newspaper men, however, last week retracted all their charges against the committee, admitting that the recall fund had not been misused and categorically taking back all the statements they proposed to make in the special edition, including the in- ference that Governor Frazier and other farmer-elected state officials were dissatisfied with the way the re- call defense fund was being handled. Because of this retraction the com- mittee has dismissed the charges of libel against Totten and Gummerson. The state committee, previously to the retraction and dismissal of the libel charges, had ordered.a firm of public accountants to examine the League books and make a public re- port on the receipts and expenditures affecting the recall defense fund. The farmers of North Dakota have the fullest confidence in the state commit- tee, having chosen its members from among themselves to manage the League, and the state officials elected by the League also have confidence in the committee. The incident was magnified by the opposition and now* that the retraction- removes even a suspicion that the League committee is mot on the square, the League in North Dakota has been strer}gthened. MADE HIM CURIOUS Editor Nonpartisan Leader: My eye caught an old copy of your Leader; in fact it may not have been so old, but it was ragged. Dates were all 'gone, but it still had some mighty good reading that interested me. One article alone, “Putting the Gas Back Into Gasoline,” surely was good. Will you send me some sample copies of the Nonpartisan Leader, please. Peetz, Col, F.L.VAN GORDER. Unfair Competition of Packers - & Congressman Beck of Wisconsin Makes Speech, Puts Leader Figures in Congressional Record ONGRESSMAN JOSEPH D. BECK of Wisconsin, during the debate on the packer control bill, pre- sented to congress the livestock and meat published in the Nonpartisan Leader of June 13. The Leader’s figures, which are reproduced on page 2764 of the Congressional Record for June 16, showed that while livestock prices have declined 41% per cent in a year, wholesale meat has de- clined only 29%. per cent and retail meat only 18% per cent. In the course of his speech Mr. Beck told of the unfair competition put up by the packers against inde- pendent and farmer companies, which, he said, the packer control bill was intended to remedy. He said: ““It is a matter of record, I think, that when the Wisconsin cheese feder- ation was in process of formation the packers had divided the state up into districts, one taking one district, an- other taking another, and when the’ purchasing agents of one encroached upon the territory of another he was immediately reported and summarily dealt with. “When stock arrives at the stock- yards, the same division of territory prevails, and part of the yards is cov- ered by one packer, another by an- other, and competition in buying is practically eliminated. “Look at the onslaught the packers are making on the dairy interests of the country. In my town a packer has established a cream station and is buying cream and shipping it-to Du- buque, Iowa, when the farmers of my community have one of the best co- operative creameries in the country, which is capable of taking care of all the cream produced in that section. “The packers have about 60 large creameries scattered throughout the dairy - section of this country, sur- rounded by nearly 2,000 skimming sta- tions, and they often ship cream 300 miles or more to one of their creamer- ies, but in only one case, so far as’'1 know, does more than.one packer oc- cupy the same territory. MILLER’S SUIT " GOT HIM LITTLE “At Reno, Nev., one of these pack- ers paid 7 cents more per pound for butterfat than it was worth in San Francisco, and sold the butter upon the San Francisco market in competi- tion with the local creamery. At Merkle and Decatur, Ind., another packer pays from 3 cents to 6 cents more per pound for butterfat, in com- petition with the locally owned cream- eries, than they pay at any of their 150 skimming stations surrounding these two places, and where they are not in competition with other cream- eries or skimming stations. “Take the case of Rudolph Miller of Macon, Mo. Rudolph Miller made the first prize butter exhibited at the Buf- falo exposition. I-am told he estab- lished a creamery at Macon, and in 1900, or about that date, a packer es- tablished a creamery at Chillicothe, about 150 miles away. In 1908 this packer began buying cream in Miller’s territory, paying 30 cents per pound for butterfat, a price so far above the ° market price that Miller could not compete. The company shipped this cream 150 miles, churned it into but- ter, shipped the butter back to Macon, and sold it for 27% cents per pound. But the company made up this loss by paying the farmers only 24 cents per pound for butterfat at other stations in that locality. PAGE FOURTEEN ; b figures on the- prices of | “It has been said that we have a law already on the books that would -pro- tect Rudolph Miller, or the farmers, against this unjust discrimination. Yes; we have a law against discrimi- nation of this kind, but let me tell you how it works. Miller discovered that law and tried it out on the packer. In 1914 he engaged an attorney and started prosecution.” After going - through court for a period of about three years the United States supreme - court confirmed a,decision convicting the packer and fining him $5,000. The fine was paid,but the packer continued the practice of discrimination against Miller as calmly, peacefully and se- renely as if nothing had ever happen- ed, and yet, in a letter from one of the packers, I am told those years were lean years for the packers. They must have been fat years for Rudolph Miller and the farmers who paid the bills; PACKER METHODS ARE DENOUNCED “Therefore, while we have laws against discrimination, it would bank- rupt any farmer to proceed--under them, and even if he does proceed and wins his case, it does not get him any- where. He must pay attorney fees and other expenses in connection with his case, often reaching into the thou- sands, while the packer simply takes his expenses and fines out of the farm- <ers. It is a good law for trusts, but not for farmers. "“This assault upon the farming in- terests in this country by organized greed is not new. It is as old, per- haps, as farming itself. But it never became so great a menace until filled cheese made from animal fats and skimmed milk was put upon the mar-’ ket and sold for 5 cents a pound, or less, in competition with the genuine article, and often sold as the genuine article. “After a struggle lasting many years congress enacted a law taxing the filled-cheese industry out of exist- ence. Then the packers turned their attention to the manufacture of imita- tion butter, and after another struggle lasting for years the farmers secured - partial relief from this menace in what is called the oleomargarine law. But no sooner had it been enacted than it began to be amended upon one pretext or another until now they are able by some process or other to extract the lard and tallow out of the butchered animal, replace it with water and other ingredients, sell the animal at the same price as if the lard or tallow had_not been extracted, take the lard and tallow, which cost less than 10 cents a pound, mix it with vegetable oils and make it over into oleomar- garine, pay one-fourth of 1 per cent per pound tax, put a little coloring matter in a separate package, and sell this oleomargarine in competition with pure dairy butter that costs the farmer. as much as four times what this stuff costs. “Look what they are doing with eggs. They have been buying eggs in my town for 10 and 12 cents per dozen. Next winter the consumers will pay anywhere from 50 to 60 cents per doz- en for those same eggs. I presume ‘the reason for that will bé to make up for what the packers call ‘the lean years of 1911 and 1912 During the year 1912 the packers made, clear of all expenses; over $18,000,000. During the war they increased those earnings to over $95,000,000 a year. The pack- ers say ‘1912-was a lean year.” If that was a lean year, what would a fat year be? That is nearly as much net money as all the farmers in the state * j B T