Republican farmer., 1919-07-18
5 PACKERS WOULD CONTROL FOOD SUPPLY

States. ss per cent. of the total of all interstate slaughterers. They main tained 1,297 peddler car routes, list ing 5S,000 towns-including duplica- tions on lists of the different peddlers or 902 per cent. of car routes of all interstate slaughterers
 The branch houses,' explains the report, which are located in the cities and large towns, are supple mented by a wide-reaching 'peddIer car service, which consists of refrig- orator cars loaded with meats and provisions operating over what are known as car routes. These peddler cars are in effect miniature branch houses on wheels. reaching thousands of small communities where trade is not sufficient to justify the invest ment in a branch house." Branch house car route sales of the Big Five for 1916 were 5S.2 per cent of their total sales for that year. or over S925. 900. During that year, the Big Five sold through these means some 6,500,00O,O0O pounds of com modittes, or something like 65 pounds per capita for the entire population Of the continental United States; or l56 pounds per capita, of popula ton towns GOO inhabitants.
 Branch house sales of fresh and cured meat by all interstate slaughter CTS in 1916 showed the Big Five sold "4-9 per cent. of fresh meat S6S per cent. of cured meat. and 92.S of fresh and cured combined.
 The 1,120 Big Five branch houses represented in 1916 a book value of investment of S3O.275, $50, with sales of S7S3.343,5 ,5f9. As to branch houses where both land and buildings were owned, the investment was S2O,1S4,- 427 and sales s33S, ,S66, ,1SS-an in vestment per dollar of sales of six cents.
 IN SOUTH AMERICA.
 From establishment of a single piant in Argentina in 1907 by Swift X Company. the American Packers, Swift, Armour, Morris and Wilson, had developed by 1917 until for that year they exported 57.4 per cent of all exports of frozen and chilled beef quarters from Argentina and Uru- quay.
 Tt is significant of their power and the rapidity of their action," says the report that in 1910, three years after the entrance into the River Plate (Argentina) field, they had se- cured control of over 40 per cent of the trade; that in 1915 they had sub stantially 65 per cent; and that their weighted average control during the eight years from 1910 to 1917 was 55 per cent. In this period they export ed nearly 22,OOO,0OO quarters of beef from these two South American countries, which represents well over 5000, 900 head of cattIe''
 The American packers control or are associated with IT meat com panies or holding companies in South America, according to their reports to the Commission.
 CHRONOLOGICAL GROWTH.
 Commenting on an elaborate table of The Packers Progress 1857 l917,' the report says:
 To reconstruct the economic and financial history that lies behind this pare record of outward change would be an undertaking replete with hu- man Interest There can be little doubt that such a history, if it could be written, would reveal inagin- Sttion, energy, shrewdness and in domitable determination on the part Of the founders of these great sIaughtering companies, but would also reveal, even if obscurely, a back ground of wreckage brought about by unfair and oppressive methods followed by these packers in theil, progress toward their goals"
 From four slaughtering plants in the decade. 1S5S-1S67, the Big Five had built or acquired by 1917. 91 slaughter plants-22A times the number in 1867. In the ten years from 1908 to 1917, their number of slaughtering plants increased 60 pe, cent.
 Swift, Morris and Aromur increas- ed their cattle slaughter from 25So.- 6e5 head in 1898 to 5,157,s3O in 1916. doubling their kill in those IS years. From slaughterinG 749 per cent of cattle slaughtered in interstate com merce in 1907-1908. the Big Five jumped to SOS per cent. by 1916 1917, from 8 per cent in calves to 73.6; from 71.6 in sheep to S6e: from 53.2 in swine to 60.2 In the face of this nine-year growth of the Big Five, the independent Interstate slaughterers lost ground in actual number of head slaughtered as we'll as in their proportionate shares. In 1907-19o8, all interstate independents slaughtered 1,7S6,120 cattle and by 1916-1917 had dropped to 1,7S3,51S- their interstate slaughter cut down proportionately one-ffth in nine years. During this period, the Big Five slaughter grew from 5,S30, ,155 head to 7.515.971. In sheep, the indC, pendent fell off from 2,753,45S to only 1524 5I7; while the Big Five in creased from 6,949.0 to 9,S1s,S01. The independents lost over one-half in sheep and lambs; three-tcnths in calves and over one-Seventh in swine. FIUME POSTERS