The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1919-07-18
F0RCEFULLy SHOWN IN THE
MEAT INDUSTRY PROBE
REPORT IS MADE PUBLIC.
Monopoly of All Other Foods Is
Within the Grasp Of
big Five
Especial to The Free Press.l


an approaching domination of the
nations food supply by the Big Five
Chicago meat packers, the federal
trade commission today made public
Part l of its report to the president
on its investigation Of the meat in
dustry, bearing on Extent and
Growth of Power of the Five Pack
ers in Meat and Other Industries"
"An approaching packer domino
ton of all important foods in this
country and an international control
of meat products with foreign COM
panies seems certainty unless
fundamental action is taken to pre-
vent it," the report says.
a fair consideration of the course
the five packers have followed and
the position they have already reach
ed must lead to the conclusion that
market of the country's food indus
tries and the y-product indus
tries linked Herewith.
"The meat packer. control of other
foods will not require long in devel-
oping"
Declaring "the history of the pack
ers' growth is interviewer with ille-
gal combinations, rebates and with
undisclosed control of corporations"
the report also urged the Importance
of full publicity of corporate owner
ship for all industries. "As to devices
for securing control, these does not
eexist adequate law. In its absence
unfair competition may run its
course to the goal of monopoly and
accomplish the ruin of competitors
without the secret ownership being
suspected and consequently without
complaint to the commission or in
vestigation Of facts. The competi-
tor is in jeopardy so long as he has
not the knowledge of true ownership
and the public is entitled to such
knowledge"
Ex.ensiveness Of Packer Activities.
Pointing out the Big Five packers
Jointly or separately WELD controll-
ing interest in STA companies, min
ority interest in ninety-five others
and undetermined interest in nine
ty-three-Ma total OF 1852 companies
and that they produce or deal in
some IT'S commodities. largely food
products, the report gives this pic
ture Of growing packer invasion into
related and unrelated industries:
in addition to meat foods, they
produce or deal in such divers COM
modities as fresh tomatoes and ban
10 strings, leather and cotton seed
oil, breakfast foods. vim fiz, curled
hair. pepsin, and washing powders.
Their branch houses are not only
stations for the distribution of meat
and poultry, but take on the charac-
ter OF wholesale grocery stores. deal
ers in various kinds of produce and
jobbers to special lines of trade.
They have interests large enough
to be dominating influence in most
Of the services connected with the
production and distribution of ami
NAL foods and their by products, and
are reaching out for control, not on
ly of substitutes of animal food, but
Of substitutes for other lines into
which the indignation of their bust
ness has led them. They are factors
in cattle-loan companies making the
necessary loans to growers and feed
ers OF livestock; are interested in
railways and private car lines trans
porting livestock and manufactured
animal products in most of the i'm
portant stock yards companies-the
public market for the bulk of food
animals; and in live stock trade pa
pers on which growers and feeders
rely for market news.
They are interested in banks from
which their competitors packing.
houses borrow money: in companies
supplying machinery, ice, salt, mate
riaIs, boxes. ETC., to themselves and
their competitors; they are principal
dealers on the provision exchanges
where future prices in standard cur
ed animal products are determined;
they or their subsidiary companies
deal in hides, oleo, fertilizer materi-
al, and other crude animal by-prod-
ucts; purchase from other packers
these crude by-products, and them
selves carry the manufacture thereof
to further stage than most of their
competitors.
"They are important factors in the
leather industry, in oleomargarine
and lard substitutes, in cotton seed
oil. in fertilizer, in soap, in glue, etc.
Their vast distributing system
with the advantages arising from the
control of private cars, cold storage,
dIU n u0l-W Cfh Vi DTdlCH HOUSES, mas
enabled them to extend their activi-
ties on large scale into poultry,
eggs, cheese, butter, rice, breakfast
foods. canned vegetables, soda
fountain supplies, and other lines.
From rendering edible fats from
what would otherwise be wasted in,
their own factories, they have reach
ed out to secure for rendering the
waste fat and bones Of local butchers
in large sections of the country, and
in some instances are interested in
companies contracting for the dis
posal of garbage of large cities.
individuals of the Armour family
are owners of grain and elevator
companies, and J. Ogden Armour and
the president of one of the Armour
subsidiaries are important stock
holders in a company producing from
mineral deposits in Utah substitute
for potash as an element of CONNER
cial fertilizer.
81. Ogden Armours is also a prom
inent factor in the American Inter
national Corporation. with it's ship
ping and ship building interests, its
import and export companies in vari-
GUS lines, its interest in a company
organized to develop cattle raising.
meat packing, quebach extract and