The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-08-19

I JuSC take 8 look at the Bituminous Coal Division, which is now involved in about as many price-f1xing cases as a gov- ernment agency can be. BCD is re- spcnsible for only one commodity soft coal.
 You might think its problem rela- lively simple, as there are only some 15,000 coal mines to worry about. If, however, you were to null tiply BCD's grief by the hundreds of thousands of similar agencies that would have to be set up to ad- minister prices on hundreds or thousands of other commodities you can easily see just what mess the country would be in.
 20 MONTHS
 ON THIS JOB
 For bit of background, you may recall that the present bituminous coal act was passed in 1897. In the spring of 1888, the old Bituminous Coal Commission began hearings on the establishment of minimum1 prices for the coal industry. In July, 1889, the old commission was abol- ished and the job was turned over , to the Bituminous Coal Division of the Interior Department which, however, continued the hearings and retained about the same per- sonnel. Those hearings continued until January, 1940-or more than 20 months.
 Wouldn't it be fun, today, with imitation at the door, to hold hear ings for 20 months on whether or not to put maximums on the price of wheat, corn or cotton?) Anyway, the hearings didn't set- tie the matter. When the BCD had all it's evidence, literally millions of pages of testimony, it had to go into retirement for nine months be- fore giving birth to its schedule of prices. That schedule saw the light of day October 1, 1940 - just 2 1-2 years after the hearings began. In other words, if the government began today under this full hear ing procedure, you could expect price schedules on silk hose or rub Der tires-well, with luck you might have it by New Years Day, 1944.
 Even when the coal code price schedule was published, the mat ter wasn't settled. There were act- ually thousands of prices and no- body, even today, knows how many prices there are in that schedule. There was a price for practically ever yone of the 15,000 mines, for every one of the 15,000 mines, for qualities of coal, and the mine price was different for every market. Six hundred mine operators found fault with the schedule, as you might expect, and their cases had to be reviewed. Changes were made. Then 300 appealed to Secretary Ickes, and more changes were made. Three of the 300 made appeals to federal courts, and finally the price schedule was in effect.
 GOES ON
 FOR YEARS
 ] Today, Bituminous Coal Division finds itself with two problems on it's hands. It is empowered to fix both minimum and maximum prices. On the one hand, 1t has about 100 cases on its hands, charging mine opera tors with selling coal below the min- imum prices, allowing unauthorized discounts, failing to add actual transportation charges to delivered prices, and failing to keep records. There must be hearing, 8 "triap and a decision on every case. Mind you, these are for violations of mini mum prices.
 On the other hand, prices of some of the special coals are going up. There is shortage of coals for coke and steel making Also, the demand for industrial coal has shot up the demand for coal cars. Transporta- tion of coal for domestic uses may be pinched. It may be up to Bitu- minouS Coal Division to set maxi mum prices before long.
 This sad story is told here to show the utter folly of trying to fix maxi mum prices and prevent imitation by any complex methods of boards and hearings.
 The only way to fix prices is to fix prices. Some few people may get hurt in the process. but their wounds can be licked. In the mean time, millions more win be kept from being hurt. The second moral of this piece is that If you burn coal in your furnace, the coal consumers counsel says you'd better i'll up the bin now, while there's coal and be- fore the price goes up. But maybe Iyoull figure you can keep warm by burning governmental red tape this xuif1for