Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1919-09-14
BY G. GOULD LINCOLN.


- OLD storage of foodstuffs has
been hailed as a blessing to
mankind-and it has been
condemned as a means of
profiteering in the necessaries Of life
Urged on by the President and
| strengthened in it's purpose by reams
of testimony. the House committee on
agriculture has drafted a bill for the
regulation of cold storage and the
| measure is to be pressed for early &C
| ton.
| The fight for federal legislation to
| regulate the business Of cold storage
has been on for a decade or more. Bills
! have been introduced. hearings be-
| fore congressional committees, in both
| Senate and House, have been had, but
without definite result up to the pres
! emit. But the present high cost OF Nv
| ing and the insistent demand that
| legislative steps be taken to reduce
the cost of foods has pointed the way
! to cold storage regulation, and 1t Is
! likely to come. The proposed federal
! law is framed under the power of Con-
gress over interstate commerce and
necessarily will affect only those foods
in cold storage intended for inter-
state commerce.
Basis of the Demand.
1 The demand for the regulation OF
! cold storage of foods is based upon
two grounds: First, that it Is neces-
sary to insure the public health. ana
second. that it may prevent manipu-
, lation of the markets to keep prices
high. President Wilson in his recent
address to Congress on the high cost
of living said that cold storage OF
foods is being used to keep prices on
present high levels. and that millions
upon millions of pounds of foodstuns
are today tied up in cold-storage ware
houses, which if released would bring
a tumble in prices.
Incidentally, the big meat packers
are being criticised in this connec-
ton, for they control very large
part of the cold-storage facilities Tor
food in this country. The claim is
made that they manipulate the prices
j Of beef, poultry, butter, eggs and
other commodities by merely putting
these articles of food into cold stor-
age in tremendous quantities. The
packers have been heard on the sub
, ject OF cold storage at great length
| and have denied strenoously that
| theTassa slhptr facilities for price
! naisipulatt6n or for boarding Of food
| stuffs They insist that all they do
is to take the surplus of foods at
the time Of greatest production and
store it away for the season when
the production is low.
Enforcement Big Job.
The bill drafted by the House COM
mittee provides that the proposed
law shall be known as the United
States cold-storage act" Its enforce
ment is placed in the hands OF the
Secretary of Agriculture. who. in turn.
may call upon the Department OF
Justice to prosecute violators of the
law 1t is designed to prevent hoard
ing, to prevent deterioration of foods.
deception with respect to cold-stor-
age foods and to regulate the ship
ment of such foods in interstate COM
MERGE This is some job. and the
Secretary Of Agriculture will have
his hands fuller than ever.
A more drastic bill dealing with the
same subject is that introduced in the
Senate by Senator Mcclellan of Ten
nessee, who has been fighting for
cold storage legislation ever since he
entered Congress some seven or eight
years ago. Representative Welty of
Ohio also has introduced bill. but it
proposes to deal with the cold storage
business through the taxing power
of Congress rather than through it's
control over interstate commerce. Mr.
Welty proposes that heavy taxes be
laid upon foodstuffs left in cold stor-
age after a certain period. He insists
that the owners of foods will have to
bring them out of storage under such
conditions and viii not be able to
hold back meats, butter, ETC.. to keep
prices high if they must themselves
pay high taxes on these articles in
storage. For instance, after twelve
months in storage, the owner of beef
would have to pay tax to the gov