The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1937-04-29
NEW ERA SEEN
AS REVERSAL
OF POLICY
Price" Theories
Of Brain Trusters
on Way Out
BY EARL GOODWIN


yelled hints Of commodity prices
being too high, not only indicate
the Roosevelt determination to
clean up" on the trusts, but much
to the horror of the brain-trusters,
left-wingers, Harvard economists
and the eager fair-haired boys of
yesteryear, that the whole brain
trust and MIRA attitude toward
prices and trusts is "out the
window"
A new day economically is dawn
ing in the New Deal, and that new
day doesn't look forward. 1t looks
backward to the days when the
Federal Trade Commission had its
teeth still intact and bit terrific
hunk out of the aluminium trusts
leg.
High Prices Out
The brain trust theory of high
prices and the NRA coddling of
trusts seems to be doomed, and
with it a lot of the fair-haired
young men with ideas that prices
must always be high all around to
promote continued prosperity.
Attorney General Cummings
letter to President Roosevelt
which suggests for committee to
find out just what the AdminiStra-
ton is going to think about trusts
and combinations in restraint of
trade also suggests that the trust
matter oe laid partly on the Fed
erai Trade Commission doorstep.
The attorney general believes that
the courts have made it almost
impossible to send criminal trust
to the doghouse or any of it's Of
ficials to Jail, but he does recall
that this same Aluminium Com
pany of America was adjudged a
trust of the most complete kind
by the Federal Trade Commission
in the Coolidge administration
while Andrew Mellon, head alumni
mum company Stockholder, was
the Secretary Of the Treasury.
New Attitude
So the administrators new anti
trust position seems to be one Of
faith in the old woodrow Wilson
idea that a trust was a bad thing
and ought to be broken up, that
combinations to keep up prices
are bad and should be stopped.
The Federal Trade Commission
attack on the Aluminium Company
of America, in 1924, was politt-
three
Republicans and two Democrats
on the commission which was
headed by Huston Thompson, a
Democrat. as chairman.
Congress had bucked against
rising household prices and or
dered the commission to investi-
gate. The commission literally
started with the parlor and living
room and ended up in the kitchen
and in the kitchen ran across a
combination which kept alumni
mum kitchenware at high price
levels-and discovered what they
charged was an aluminium trust
of the most complete sort.
The commission sent a report
to Congress completely Repub-
lican) which exploded with a ter
rifle reverberation which brought
from Andrew Mellon, known to
be an aluminium company founder
and financier, the statement that
he was no longer in the business,
and that anyhow the Federal
Trade Commission chairman,
Democratic Mr.. Thompson, was
playing politics. Then it was
shown that not only Chairman
Thompson, but that all the other
members, Republicans included,
had approved the report which
attacked the Mellon empire right
while Mr.. Mellon himself was Sec
rotary of the Treasury.
Removal Try Fails
One of the untold secrets of
that day is that President Cool
idge quietly tried to effect the re-
rnovaI of Chairman Thompson
but nothing happened, not even
a court case against the Aluminium
Company of America which was so
plainly shown to be the only alu.
minum outfit in the United States
that the commission believed it
to be an open and shut case
easily prosecuted in court.
There was, however, too much
Democratic politics in the matter
for a political administration to
prosecute. John w. Davis. who
had campaigned against Calvin
Coolidge for the Presidency. had
delivered two scathing attacks on
the Aluminium Company of Amer
lea in the campaign. However,
the last act of Attorney General
Stone, in the Coolidge cabinet, be-
fore he took a seat on the Supreme
Court bench, vas to declare that
the Aluminium Company of Amer
lea should be attacked as mon
opoly.
Nothing Ever Done
Whether on account of politics
or not, nothing was ever done to
follow up the Federal Trade Com
mission investigation and report.
When MIRA was established and
began to run there was a price,
raising, price fixing policy that
amazed some of the old truSt-bust-
ing crusaders of the Theodore
Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson
days, but the economics of the
early.Rooseveltian Brain Trust
were all of that school. The Fed
eral Trade Commission, mean