Evening star., 1942-09-29
The Political Mill
American Former, Seeking Equoty Of Treatment,
Is Made the forget Of the Price Controllers
BY GOULD LINCOLN


Ever since Labor Day a great
effort to dramatic the American
farmer as the l1orrid villain in
the piece Save America From
Imitation" has been thoroughly
underway. His aids have been
pictured as Congress and the
Iarm organizations themselves.
The cost of living has been
going up. There was every
chance that it would continue to
go up. President Roosevelt sent
a message to Congress and de-
lvered a radio speech to the
American people, demanding that
steps be taken by Congress to
curb farm prices, adding that he
himself would handle wages Of
industrial labor - which have
scared to new heights with the
vast war program underway.
These were the two great items
in the cost of producing and the
cost of living in this country,
which were not controlled as they
should have been in the so-called
Price Control Act, under which
the country has been operating
for many months now. Farm
prices, under this law, have been
privileged to go to 110 of parity"
(the formula devised years ago to
equalize the farmers dollar with
that of industry. Labor's wages
were not fixed at all in the law,
and no ceiling for them what
ever was attempted.
Fair warning of what was to be
expected-in the matter of in
creased cost of living-was given
the administration by Bernard M.
Baruch, head of the War Indus
tries Board in the last war, and
by Representative Gore of Ten
nessee and some other members
of Congress. No attention was
paid to these warnings, however.
The farm lobby was on the Job
at the time. But so, too, was the
labor lobby, of which nothing is
heard now in the bursts of indig-
nation over the farmer and his
prices. The farm lobby may be
effective, but compared to the
labor lobby 1t is a gentle zephyr
instead of a gale when 1t hits
Washington.
President Right.
The President was entirely
right to demand that steps be
taken to halt inflationary moves,
to prevent the ever-increasing
cost of living. He told Congress
bluntly that if it did not act by
october l he would himself use
the powers which he has during
the war to control farm prices.
He said that he himself would
Stabilize" industrial wages.
The difficulty was that Con-
gress and the farmers had heard
the talk of stabilizing wages be-
fore-and the only evidence Of
any movement on the part of
wages was an upward movement.
Senators and Representatives
in Congress from agricultural
States-some from industrial
States, too-say fatty that the
farmers would have been willing
to have an effective price ceiling
placed on farm products from
the very first of the price-con-
troll agitation If there had been
at the same time an effective
ceiling placed on the prices
of the things the farmer has to
buy-and on industrial wages,
which necessarily affect the
prices of the things the farmers
must buy. They insist that the
farmers-and their organizations
and their lobby-have only been
trying to protect the farmers, to
keep them from being made the
goat" in a vast infiationary
movement.
Mistake Months Ago.
The mistake was made months
ago. The Congress passed the
kind of a bill demanded by the
administration-although at the
time the representatives of the
farmers, in and out of Congress,
succeeded in getting through pro-