Evening star., 1935-03-10
SENATE.ROOSEVELT ROW
HAILED AS NORMAL SIGN
President Declared Taking Only Course
Open to Avoid Socialistic
System in U. S.

may suggest and recommend, as the
Constitution and tradition prescribes
ne should, but the bills will be written
by the appropriate committees. after
debate and discussion within the COM
mittee. And the measures will be de-
bated and voted upon, in the Senate
certainly. with the normal scrutiny
and the normal use of amendments.
n. r. A. Inquiry Is Result.
One result of the return of normal
relations between Congress and the
President is the setting up by the Sen
ate of a committee to investigate
N. r. A.
1t is not only that N. R. A. requires
looking into N. R. A. has come into
the limehght largely because it was
enacted for two years, be-
cause the two years expire June 16.
next. and because by that date N
R. A. must either disappear utterly
or else be re-enacted in such form
and with such notifications as Con-
gress may determine. For that rea-
son N R. A is about to be subjected
to critical examination.
A. A. A. does not have any time
was enacted as an or
dinary statute to remain on the books
until repeal or change. But A. A. A.
calls for inquiry. If it remains in its
present form it will bring about far
reaching changes.
The principal intention Of A. A. A.
was to raise the prices of farm crops.
Those prices have risen. What part
A. A. A. played in the rise. what part
is to be credited to other causes. and
how much rise in price of farm crops
might have taken place had A. A. A.
never been invented-all that is COM
paratively immaterial. The funda-
mental and cheering fact is that far
merS have received larger prices for
their crops. From this rise has come
solid cornerstone of improvement:
rise in prices OF crops has enabled
the farmer to pay his debts or to
reduce them or to feel comfortable
under them. No longer do the news
papers carry dispatches from the
South and West about mortgage fore
closures, or tragic stories of evictions
Other Phases Need Inquiry.
But some other consequences Of
A. A. A. call for inquiry. From the
point Of view of individuals, mere rise
in price can be an advantage to those
who are beneficiaries of it. But from
the point of view of the Nation. Of all
of us, mere rise in prices is not neceS-
sarily wealth.
Let us list the steps, the segment Of
the vicious circle" which in one re-
Spect A. A. A. is: Secretary of Agricul-
ture Wallace starts out to raise the
prices of crops. AS one way of doing
this, acreage is reduced. Reduction of
acreage brings the intended result
prices go up. Because prices go up the
consumer buys less. Because the con-
sumner buys less, the acreage for the
next year must logically be reduced
still further, for the whole theory of
A. A. A. is to keep acreage in proper
ton to consumption. If acreage is
still further reduced, prices 60 up still
further. If prices go yet further up,
is yet further restricted.
And so the unwholesome spiral goes.
We are now approaching the vicious
part of the circle. Prices of food and
clothing are going higher. Mr.. Wal
lace'S estimate is that we have just
ahead of us a further increase of
some II per cent in the cost of living.
That estimate is modest. If it came
from man less candid than Secre-
tary Wallace we might suspect that
self-interest had made the figures low
But it is one of the curious traits Of
the unusual personality of the pres
ent Secretary of Agriculture that not
only is he candid to his own detri-
ment; he seems actually to take kind
of puritanic pleasure in putting things
in the worst light. Even so, am not
sure he has gone as far as he safely
might in naming II per cent as the
extent of the coming rise in the cost
of living.
Dilemma Facing Wallace.
Mr.. Wallace must be aware, too.
that when householders begin to pay
the increased bill, they will have re-
fections, unfavorable to him, about
the killing of hogs, the blowing under
of cotton, and the limitation of other
crops. This reflection will be made
the more keen when the householder
learns that we are about to import
from other countries corn and wheat
at least. and perhaps some other
farm crops that enter into the cost
of living. To explain why we should
be buying food from abroad within
two years after the Government paid
out large amounts of money to bring
about destruction food, will call for
true ingenuity from Mr.. Wallace.
Far-seeing persons in the South
have become aware of the vicious
circle. A. A. AS method of reducing
cotton acreage is to levy a process
ing" tax on the buyer of cotton, and
then give the proceeds to the farmer
in exchange for the promise to re-
duce acreage. when time and ex-
perience,' says the Texas Weekly,
have written the full history of the
Governments cotton program it is
probably that the cotton processing
tax of ~ cents pound on cotton
will have been found to have done
more lasting harm than any other
item in the program. The processing
tax through raising the price of goods
is restricting cotton consumption"
If A. A. A. is continued indefinitely
in its preesnt form, there will be
economic revolution in the South, so
extreme that the unheard of may
emerge, in the form of secession of
the South from the Democratic party.
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