The San Francisco call., 1903-12-10

Board of State Harbor Commissioners
and viii ask the court to restrain the
HarbOr Commissioners from interfer-
ing with the sale by them of perish
able produce in the city and county OF
San Francisco.
The firms that will so act have all
been deprived of their permits to sell
on the State property, this under the
provisions Of the Woodward law. With
this Will begin the test of the extent Of
the Jurisdiction and powers of the Har-
Dor Commissioners, as conferred by the
Woodward law. The suits will be filed
by Attorney ]. B. Reinstein, who ap-
pears for the commission men. No re-
cent proceedings have possessed more
of interest for the whole State.
The Woodward law was enacted for
the express purpose of preventing the
formation of fruit-selling ring or con-
spiracy. The Harbor Commissioners,
when they voted last week to take
away the permits from Wolf & Sons.
L. Scatena & Co, Wetmore Brothers
and McDonough & RunyOn, were aware
that a test Of the law was Threatened.
They held that the parties who had
lost their permits through revocation
had been given a right TO permits upon
the fulfillment of certain conditions.
which compelled them to buy and sell
impartially, without regard to the af-
filiations or affiliations of the par
ties with whom they did business. The
Commissioners believed that the condi-
tions had been violated and so took
the permits away.
Scatena e Co, Wetmore Brothers.
Wolf & Sons and McDonough & Run
yOn stoutly deny that they have vio-
lated the law. Yesterday w H Wolf,
A. J. Runyon, John G. Wetmore and A.
Giannini, the latter representing Sea-
tena & Co, filed a long communication
with the Board Of Harbor Commission
ers. In that they submitted sugges-
tions at great length for the considera-
tiOn Of the Commissioners. 1t amount
ed, in fact. to a circumstantial denial
OF all the charges that have been made
against their firms and also contained
some reflections upon the Harbor Com
missioners' acts. 1t also embodied the
views Of the wholesalers at large.
CASES NOT REOPENED.
When this communication was pre-
sented by President Spear to be read
to the board yesterday Commissioner
Kirkpatrick said that he supposed that
II amounted to a request for a rehear-
ing The four firms represented by the
signatures 70 the document had already
had hearing and so far as they were
concerned the matter was closed and
their cases would not be reopened. He
asked President Spear if this was his
view Of the case and Spear answered
in the affirmative. The board cour-
teously listened TO the reading of the
document. however.
1t began by setting forth that, mas
much as there was not full board
when the four permits to sell were re-
vOked last week it was desired by the
signers Ito submit suggestions for con-
sideration."
Some OF the suggestions" amounted
to an attack upon the Commissioners
For instance. it was said to the Com
missioners. in one place, that natural
ly, under such circumstances we must
infer that your judgment is clouded by
some error; that your action is due to
some passion, prejudice or ignorance,
or to some consideration Of personal or
political advantage, which. of course
should play no part in what should be
a judicial determination"
In another part of the communication
it is asserted that there is not now
and never has been any conspiracy or
agreement or understanding concerning
such prices (the prices of perishable
products) and you know very well that
no one Of such organizations nor any
of their members, nor any combination
Of their members. has the slightest
power to fix, modify, control or regu-
late such prices"
Incidentally a threat was contained
in the long document, as follows:
Your act (of the Harbor Commits
affects the wholesalers direct
ly, but indirectly it affects the growers
and consumers. The growers outside
Of San Francisco have an association
and are members Of the Wholesale
Dealers Association, and are satisfied
with the present conditions. AS to the
you may compel US to re-
move from the docks all produce of
the State that comes TO San Francisco
every twenty-four hours. This will
simply mean that we must pay the en-
tirely unnecessary cost or removal TO
storage charges and the
destruction in rehandling these perish
able products. This loss we must add
10 the cost to the dealer and he must
add it to the cost to the consumer"
SUGGESTS A TEST.
After the reading of the document,
Kirkpatrick said that
the place 10 try the question of the
Jurisdiction of the board was not be-
fore the board, but in the courts. The
matter appeared to him to be directed
to the competency OF the board to act
as il had acted and the validity of its
acts.
Commissioner Spear referred to some
made in the opening of the
in which il was in sub
stance asserted that the board had |
acted in opposition to what the dealers |
had been led to expect by conversa-
ton they had with him before they |
took out their permits to sell on the |
wharves. This inference Commissioner |
Spear resented. He denied that the |