The Waterbury Democrat., 1935-04-19
By RODNEY BUTCHER Democrat Washington
 COrrcspOndcnt


 Washington, April 19 = NRA knows how to be honest with itself but not with the rest of us.. Congress would like to know whether, as Senator Borah has al- ways said. MIRA has had the effect of fostering monopolies, monopo- listic practices, and monopolistic prices.
 There's plenty of evidence that 1t has and the -evidence is to be found in NRA's own files. But in- vestigating senators, considering new legislation, will have to dig a lot deeper before they get it.
 Operating with MIRA codes, mo- nopolistic industries have frozen high prices solid. Even federal state and city governments, de- spite a special exempting order by NRA aimed at correcting the evil and saving the taxpayers a lot of money, can't get discounts on their large-scale purchases of many types or supplies.
 You can read about it in the NRA Research and Planning Divi- sion's study of the effects of Exec utive Order 6767, issued last June to permit bidders on public con- tracts to quote prices not more than 15 per cent below those al lowable to private purchasers un- der their codes of you can get a copy! Very few are available.) "Fire" Is Suppressed
 But you'd never imagine the true state of affairs if you merely read the official report on the study, prepared and addressed to the president after Senator King had asked for it.
 It isn't clear just who wrote 1t, but it's signed by Acting
 Chairman Donald Richberg of prepared with sthe dominating
 idea of supprcssing the strong language and sensational con clusions fin Research and Plan- ming Director Leon Henderson's summary of the study.
 Executive Order 6767 was an an- swer to great howl from federal. state, and city purchasing agents. who claimed taxpayers were being soaked by flood of tie-bids Oden- tical bids) on public contracts.
 It was assumed lower bids within the 15 per cent margin would be by supply industries and of bids.
 But look at few excerpts from Henderson's summary of findings:
 q. The prepondcrance of obtainable evidence indicates that Executive Order 6767 was only sporadically effective in
 incrcasing competitive auction bidding upon contracts to be let
 by public purchasing agents! Many Bids Increased
 "Out of total of 85 sets of con- tracts tudied Ca total including practically all purchases of the procurement division of the treas- ury and the bureau of supplies and accounts of the navy), Al showed an increase in the amount of tie- bidding after the order was issued, 10 showed no change, while 34 showed a decline.
 'The percentage of tie-bids in- creased notably In such industries as iron and steel. paper and pulp products and building materials. It remained about the, same in such industries as automotive, paint and varnish, chemical and glass con- tainers, and decreased substan- tially in such industries as asbes+ tos. scientific apparatus and ce- ment .. z
 Practically no evidence was found exchequers even a to the public excnequers even a fraction of the potential savings which it was hoped a IS per cent doscount upon government pur- chases would achieve. Almost uni versally bidders upon public con- tracts failed to offer dis "