Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1935-02-12

To the Editor OF The Star:
The writer holds no brief for Com
missioner Allen, but as small dairy
man who has always sold his own
milk-and hence has never sold in the
District itself because the law I'M
fairly discriminates against farmer
distribution-it has seemed to me that
the suggestion Of your Travilah corre-
spondent, whose letters recently ap-
peared in The Star, that Commissioner
Allen begrudges a living to the pro-
Queer, or could withhold living If
he did begrudge it or guarantee it II
he did not, Is not well considered. We
who are farming must analyze our
difficulties correctly before we can
hope 10 seek and find q remedy.
Up to 1894 the average retail price
of fluid milk the country over was
much higher as compared with cther
foods or with the feeds the dairyman
had to buy than it had been before the
depression. Moreover. the Washing
ton market has been returning bet
ter depression price than most of the
cities Of the Nation. This market is
now improving with the heavy addi-
lions to Government spending. so that
our troubles may, for the time being,
solve themselves; but the forced cur
tailment in production which Mr..
Gurevich rightly notes as a hardship
was undoubtedly related to this fact
of too high retail price.
If he had sold his own milk Mr..
Gurevich would soon have noticed the
increasing use of evaporated milk
amongst his customers, and would
have pondered the fact that it was
costing them less than half Of what
his milk in bottles costs them. He
might then have studied statistics
bit and found that 100,000,000 gallons
measured the decrease in fluid con-
sumption in one year, while the
canned milk business. based upon
cheap surplus" farm sales, was -four
ishing marvelously.
He might also have found that dis
tributing his milk paid him better
than producing it, for. like his mort
gage, the costs Of distribution did not
fall, in the depression, with the farm
price of foods and feeds. For these
reasons farm mortgages have not
been payable in the rest Of the Nation
witness the Minnesota moratorium
law. Why should they be payable
here?
Unfortunately insisting on our due
right to living isn't going to get it,
even under the Constitution which,
by the way, doesn't guarantee living
to any one. Too much insistence on
high milk prices only brings a lot of
excess production Gin many cities
through farmers selling their own
milk, thus precipitating a price war
and disaster to producers generally.
However, the Constitution aSsuredly
does provide against the development
Of such conditions as prevent all of
us from maintaining our credit and
mortgage payments and farm wage
scales, for it says very plainly that
Congress shall regulate the value of
money-so that prices in general can
not fall so disastrously. This Congress
has consistently failed TO do. Instead
the value of money remains at the
uncontrolled mercy of private bank
ing interests through the way in
which credit" is extended, and until
We turn in and organize to elect men
to Congress who will take an interest
in fulfilling their sworn duty in this
respect We shall have to face a lot
Of grief, for in this way, and in this
way only, can Congress. and not Com
missioner Allen, constitutionally as
sure US of fair opportunity to make
a living SO that we will not have to
face the stark reality Of losing all that
We have worked for.
ALDEN A. POTTER.