Dodge City times. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1876-1892, 1888-05-10
The CATTLE POOL

Senator's Vest and Plumb Speak Plain
Words About the Chicago Cattle Pool.
WASHINGTON, May 4.-The Animal In
igstry Bureau bill being under consldera
ton in the Senate yesterday Senators Vest
and Plumb spoke in PLAIN terms Of the out
rageous power exerted by the Chicago
cattle syndicate.
Mr.. Vest said tina: if one-tenth OF what
was stated in the correspondence which
had just been read was true, the Comuis-
sioner Of agriculture. should be hurled out
of official life. disgraced and dIshonored.
II the Commissioner had used his official
position to defeat or advance Legislation he
was unworthy TO be Il slessens IN, much
less the head of, that great department.
But he Vest did not believe these state
ments. He had been diligently searching
for the truth all through the labyrinth Of
speeches and literature on this subject. He
then spoke of what he called ''the cattle
syndicate" and said that the people were
he pless and within its power. 1t
was the most terrible tyranny ever
exercised. There were five men or
firms in the city Of Chicago which regu-
lated the price Of cattle every day. they
met every night and fixed the price for the
from the market quotations that cattle
| were to 81 cents pound, shipped his
cattle to Chicago. but whep he got there he
found that the syndicate had put beef down
to 2 or pa cents. He could not store his
cattle, as they would be diminished every
day in weight and quality, anu SO he was
cocrced to sell. He went to an agent OF
Armour's and was told that the price was
21s cents; ne went to another Armour
agent and got the same answer. He was
r1et all over the city with the unvaryicg
resnonse, ~ cents pound" AID he had
to take it. Thus these men owned the
cattle-raiser's property and conhscated it
as if they possessed the right to take it
from his farm without paying him cent.
Talk" said Mr.. Vest, "about trusts !;
talk about pools; the cattle pool of Chicago
Is the most infamous tyranny that ever
existed in the United States. They have
cot the collar on the cattle producers Of
the entire West. And / know no remedy
for it. The statesman who would invent
the remedy would deserve a monument
more enduring than the capitol. He would
perform the highest benefaction on the
people Of the Northwest and on the cattle
raisers of the country.
Mr. Plumb had also something to say on
the Same subject. In his opinion, the worst
combination III the country was the COM
binatiou of beef and pork packers, having
Its headquarters in Chicago. There was
no trust or combination, the Standard oil
trust, the sugar trust. the copper trust, or
any other trust that had had so powerful
or so baneful an influence as that combina-
ton. For years the price OF cattle to pro-
ducers had been going down. They hal
gone down, he thought, fifty Per cent. At
the same time the price OF meat to the
consumers had gone up, and every single
dollar IF the difference had gone into the
pockets of that combination. So per-
feet was their control that they knew alb
solutely not only how many cattle were
to arrive each day in Chicago, but over
what railroad lines they were to come,
where they had been shlpped from, Their
character and the men who shipped them.
When tie cattle reached Chicago toe syn
dicSte's representative was sent to view
them and put price upon them and that
was the price at which they had to be sold
unless it was made lower. No cattle COM
mission man dared to set up for himself in
Chicago. His occupation woult be imme-
6Iately gone. Uader the operation Of this
trust, the prices of cattle hal declined un-
necessarily and destructively. 1t was safe
to say that On every steer Of three years
old and upward raised west of the Missis-
sippi river during the past five years the
market value had been, by this colnblna-
ton, reduced not less than $40 head. The
damage 10 the State OF Kansas alone dur
ing that period Of time had been more
than $4,000, 600 and the wealth Of the
syndicate had grown prorortionately.
Il L.,
their pockets the money OF this stock ring
to get Congress to give them control Of the
question of the cattle quarantine. With
that control Chicago would be made
open water and st. Louis could be Cuaran-
tined against. Practically there was the
same influence in St. Louis and in Kansas
Citr. TINS combine had allies in the rail-
road managers. They had allies in the
railroads. They had made railroad officials
partners in their stockyards. partners in
their feeding stations and had given them
sops out of all the profits derived by them
from the time the cattle were shipped until
the cattle reached the abattoir in
New York or elsewhere. Step
by step they had come to the
final condition where they actually fixed
the prices of cattle jast as though they
were the men who raised them and were
the only persons in the world who did raise
them. When he considered that they then
proposed to have Congress rivet the final
chain on the cattle industry In their behalf
he was lost between admiration and indig-
nation at their audacity. He believed that
the Commissioner Of Agriculture would
do as well with the powers given in the
bill as anybody else. He had great
confidence in him. He would trust
him a thousand fold before he would trust
any one in the combine" He believed in
giving to the Commissioner of Agriculture
ell the powers proposed to be gwen to the
commission and would not vote for any
measure that would detract from the power
and dignity of that department