The Leon reporter. (Leon, Iowa) 1887-1930, 1911-10-05
Our Washington Letter.
(By Clyde H. Tavenner, special
lshington correspondent of The


Reporter.)
Washington. Sept. 30.--The farm
ers of PENNSYLVANIA sold forty-eight
million dollars worth of potatoes in
New York last year, but they were
not worth forty-eight millions to the
PENNSYLVANIA farmers. That is what
the New York consumers paid for
them. The Pennsylvania farmers
got three and three quarter mil
lions.
This statement was made by MEM
bers Of the Pennsylvania grange who
visited New York city to investigate
market conditions.
These grangers discovered that a
cold storage chicken, weighing a
pound and half, sold for a dollar in
Madison avenue. For that same
kind Of a chicken the farmers re-
ceived twelve and a half cents
pound. The farmers bought apples
for five cents each, and offered to
sell the vender from whom they
bought them all he wanted for two
dollars a barrel. Eggs which the
farmers sold for twenty-five cents
dozen brought fOrty-five cents when
sold to the New York consumer.
This vast difference between what
the farmer gets and what the con-
sumner pays represents the unearned
profits that flow into the Golfers Of
the railroads. the express companies,
and the food trusts. The railroads
get theirs in the form of excessive
rates, which must be exacted in order
to pay dividends on watered stock.
rnt hni rcS h1y
reason of the fact that one suplne
republican administration after an
other has refused to put them under
a decent regulation, and the food
trusts get theirs by maintaining I'M
necessary cold storage houses,
through which they manipulate the
supply, and create artificial "short-
ages
Nearly all the perishable food sup
plies which go to the cities are
handled by the express companies,
or by the equally monopolistic refrig-
orator lines of the food trusts, both
being owned by the railroads. Thus
the consumer pays double haulance
bill. AS soon as these products reach
the cities they are turned over to the
food trusts, who put them in cold
storage and keep them there until a
shortage" is created. Then up go
prices.
IF all the eggs stored in New
York City were placed on the mar
ket tomorrow" said one of the Penn
sylvania grangers, 1.-The price of eggs
would fall two-thirds.
What is the remedy?
80
believe that one remedy lies in the
strengthening of the interstate COM
merce law, to enable the government
to reach, and Jail, some of the owners
of the criminal food trusts and trans
portation monopolies.
1t is significant that the farmers,
for the first time in years, are "get-
ting together" on the high price
question. They know that while
their products command more than
they did a few years ago, there still
is a tremendous gap between what
they get and What the consumer
pays. They propose to find out
where the trouble lies, and it is more
than certain that their Investigations
will lead them to the headquarters
of the UNPUBLISHED trust magnates
who control the railroads, the ex-
press companies, and the food mon
opolies.
No Way to Stop This Trust.
For years and years the sugar
the government by means of false
weights and tricky springs to cheat
the scales, and by bribery of govern
ment officials, this rapacious trust d.
verified into it's own Golfers millions of
dollars that should have gone to the
government in revenue. The trust
was caught red handed in it's thiev-
cry, yet nobody was punished; no
body went to Jail.
The government finally put a stop
to the revenue stealing. The doc
tored springs were taken away, and
the corrupt customs collectors were
discharged. This forced the trust to
adopt new methods in order to main
tain it's inflated dividends, so recently
it sent out wall about a short
crop and now sugar prices are al
most as high as they were during the
civil war. The sugar trust is de-
termined to get "it's.''
Where the Money Goes.
What becomes of all the money
the big trusts extort annually from
the American people? Everybody
knows they exact millions in tribute
each year, and stranger from Mars,
were he to read the newspapers of
this country, would wonder how the
trusts could get strong boxes big
enough to store away all the money
they take from the people.
Recently an enterprising statistic
ian figured it out that American heir
esses-the majority of whom are the
daughters of American trust mag
their broken down
titled foreign husbands to enjoy the
income from one and three quarter
billions of dollars.
This money, if spent by parents in
America by whom it is earned, would |
educate approximately million
children each year. Or it would give
to the two hundred |
American workmen at good !
wages.
The Day of Reckoning.
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