Evening star., 1934-04-08
BY WILLIAM HARD

N 1OW I'm going 10 expose III
real radicals in Washington
VI Tugwell is nothing. The no
a kids from the Harvard Law
School are nothing The.
mostly just go in for some more old
style regulating" The people In
after are the actual revolutionaries.
I'll begin with the pants pressers
A counter-revolutionar among then
is on his way to the United States
Supreme Court now for having
pressed some pants for 80 cents in
stead of for the 10 cents which the
New York City pants-preSsing code
authority said he should. This fell
low. operating as the Spotless Dollar
Cleaners. Inc, is scheduled to be the
historic turn-table on which much OF
the question of the constitutionality
of the N. R. A. will revolve. He's not
charged with any wage-cutting. His
crime is price-cutting only. He's an
anti-price-fixer
Associations to Blame.
Now who put price-fxing into the
pants-pressing code. which, in more
elevated official manner, is called the
Cleaning and Dyeing Code? 1t was
not, really, Gen. johnson. 1t was
not any corn-borer- from within out OF
Secretary Wallace's outfit of alleged
BolshevikS disguised as agriculturiSts
1t was the National Association OF
Dyers and Cleaners and the National
Association of Retail Tailors, Cleaners
and Dyers.
These gentlemen said, and truly,
that they were having a tough time
among themselves because of compe-
tition. So they Overwhelmingly de-
manded that they be authorized to
establish code authorities among
themselves to fix the prices which
all cleaners and dyers should charge
These prices would make cleaning and
dyeing profitable instead of unprofit-
able. Leave it to the code authorities
to see to that!
Such was the economic philosophy
of the matter. And my point is that
it was not brought forward by the
Government. 1t was brought forward
and insisted upon by the industry.
That is, by the bulk of the industry,
by the dominant majority of it.
Business Mans Philosophy.
In other words, it was a business
mans philosophy. And my further
point is that this same philosophy
the fixing or affecting of prices by
code authorities under public govern
mental sanctionS-haS been inserted
into scores and scores of other codes
here, and always by the vigorous ar
guing and lobbying of the business
men themselves.
Now let us just analyze the differ
ence between this sort of thing and
the regulating" which appears, for
instance, in Mr.. Tugwell'S foods and
drugs bill
Mr.. Tugwelrs bill, if you are manu-
featuring quinine, for example, tells
you that it must be quinine, if you
call it quinine, and that you cannot
claim that it mends broken limbs
The bills essential purpose is simply
that you must not cheat. The meth
ods it suggests toward that end may
be wise or unwise. I think some of
them extremely unWise. The out
come sought. however, is utterly
harmless to the basic principle OF
private property in quinine Your
quinine is still wholly yours. You
must not represent it, but it remains
yours in all senses, including the
sense which is most precious to the
concept of private property as an in
stitution.
Endeavoring to Destroy Price.
And what is that sense? Price, of
course. A thing is NINE really mine,
if, when I choose to part with it, !
can part with it on any terms please
That Is the fundamental character
1stic of free private property. And
that is precisely the characteristic
that our business men are endeavor-
ing to destroy
In at least 80 codes they have
managed to get for themselves a
scheme called the open price sys-
tenn" the acknowledged purpose OF
which is to check sellers from selling
too low" though they may wish to
sell too low" In at least 80 codes
they have managed to accumulate pro-
visions designed to prevent sellers
1IOIll SelllllS UtlOW COSI, IllOuSll IllCy
may wish to sell below cost" In at
least II codes they have contrived
to arrive-ass in the cleaning and dye
ing code-at outright exact price -f1xa-
ton.
In all these instances the former
fundamental right" of disposal, pos
sessed by a man over his own prop
erty, is to be circumscribed by de-
cisions of a majority of his competi-
tors fortified by invoked permissions
of N. r. A. administrators and in
yoked coercions of United States
courts.
Variety of Cute Clauses.
But our business men, in their rev.
olutionary assault upon the core ol
capitalism, have not stopped mere
They additionally have inserted into
some so codes a variety of cute
clauses for limiting the running time
of mills and factories and for limiting
the introduction of new machinery
and for limiting the output of each
aggregation of machinery already ir
existence.
I pass over the strong resemblance
which these devices exhibit to the
trade-union Limitation devices which
the National Association of Manufac-
turers SO strongly condemns in the
American Federation of Labor. an
moved here simply to construct the
ideal N. r. A. code as apparently II
would be constructed by our business
men if they could get all their re-
splendent ideas into one bright blaze
of perfect code glory.
We will now enact a sugar code
All the farmers-to begin with-Shal
produce just so much sugar. That