Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1919-08-14


recommendations designed to reduce the
cost of living follows:
Gentlemen of the Congress:
have sought this opportunity to ad-
dress you because il ia clearly my duty
to call your attention to the present cost
of living and to urge upon you with all
the persuasive force of which I am capa-
bic the legislative measures which would
be most effective in controlling IL ana
bringing 1t down. The prices the people
OF thls country are paying for everything
that 1t Is necessary for them to use In
order to live are not justified by short
age In supply, either present or prospec-
1--WE, ana are In many cases artihcially
and deliberately created by vicious prac-
tees which ought Immediately to be
checked by law. They constitute bur-
den upon us which is the more unbear-
able because we know that It Is wilfully
imposed by those who have the power and
that 1t can by vigorous public action be
greatly lightened and made to square with
the actual conditions of supply and de-
mand. Some of the methods by which
these prices are produced are already lille
gal, some of them criminal. and those who
employ them will be theoretically pro-
ceeded against but others have not yet
be dealt with at once by legislation.
I need not recite the particulars of this
critical matter; the prices demanded and
paid at the sources of supply, at the
factory, in the food markets, at the shops.
in the restaurants and hotels, alike in
| the city and in the village. They are
familiar to you. They are the talk of
every domestic circle and of every group
of casual acquaintance even. 1t Is
matter of familiar knowledge, also, that
I process has set in which Is likely, UNI
less something is done, to push prices
and rents and the whole cost of living
higher and yet higher, in a vicious cycle
to which there Is no logical or natural
end. With the increase in the prices Of
the necessaries of life come demands for
increases in wages-demands which are
justified If there be no other means of
enabling men to live. Upon the increase
of wages there follows close an increase
in the price of the products whose
producers have been accorded the in
crease-not a proportionate increase, for
the manufacturer does not content HIM
self with that, but an increase consider
ably greater than the added wage cost
and for which the added wage cost Is
oftentimes hardly more than an excuse.
The laborers who do not get an increase
in pay when they demand 1t are likely
to strike, and the strike only makes mat
ters worse. 1t checks production. 1t
affects the. railways. 1t prevents distribu-
ton and stops the markets, so that there
is presently nothing to buy, and there is
another excessive addition to prices re-
sulting from the scarcity.
| These are facts and forces with which
we have become only too familiar; but
| inc nf
familiarity with them or because of
any hasty and shallow conclusion that
they are natural and inevitable in
sitting inactively by and letting them
work their fatal results if there is any
thing that we can do to check. cor
rect or reverse them I have sought
this opportunity to inform the Con-
gress what the executive Is doing by
way Of remedy and control, and to
suggest where effective legal remedies
are lacking and may be supplied.
We must, I think, frankly admit that
there is no complete immediate remedy
to be had from Legislation and executive
action. The free processes of supply
and demand will not operate of them
selves and no legislative or executive
action can force them into full and
natural operation until there is peace.
There is now neither peace nor war.
All the world Is waiting-with what
unnerving fears and haunting doubts.
who can adequately say? Waiting to
know when it comes-a peace in which
, each nation shall shift for itself If
it can, or a peace buttres sed and sup
ported by the will and concert of the
nations that have the purpose and the
power to do and to enforce what is
right. Politically, economically. So
inII, 81, VII ;e ka = iy,er
table, and it has not been possible
to administer any anaesthetic. 1t is
conscious. 1t even watches the capital
operation upon which 1t knows that
it's hope of healthful life depends. 1t
cannot think it's business out or make
plans or give intelligent and provident
direction to it's affairs while In such
a case. Where there is no peace of
mind there can be no energy in en-
] deavor There can be no confidence
! in industry, no calculable basis for
credits, no confident buying or sys-
tematic selling, no certain prospect of
| employment, no normal restoration OF
business, no hopeful attempt at recon-
struction or the proper reassembling
of the dislocated elements of enterprise
until peace has been established and so
far as may be. guaranteed.
Our national life has no doubt been less
radically disturbed and dismembered than
the national life of other peoples whom
fthe war more directly affected, with all its
terrible ravaging and destructive force.
but 1t has been, nevertheless, profound
ly affected and disarranged. and our in
dustries, our credits, our productive ca
pacity. our economic processes are mex
trcably interviewer with those of other
nations and peoples-most intimately or
all nations and peoples upon whom the
chief burden and confusion of the war
fell and who are now most dependent upon
cooperative action of the world.
We are just now shipping more goods
out of our ports to foreign markets than
we ever shipped before-not foodstuns
merely, but stuffs and materials of every
sort; but this is no index of what our
foreign sales will continue to be or or
the effect the volume of our exports Will
have on supplies and prices 1t Is impos-
sible yet to predict how far or how long
foreign purchasers will be able to ma
the money or the credit to pay for or sus-
tain such purchases on such a scale; how