The potters herald. [volume] (East Liverpool, Ohio) 1899-1982, 1950-07-06

NeWsprInt Maker
Sees Price-Fixing
Benevolent Move
Washington (LPA) = A picture
of how the biggest producer of
newsprint on the North American
continent looks on its role as a sort
of benevolent price-setter was un-
folded before the House Monopoly
Investigating committee by John
H. Hinman, president of Interna-
tional Paper Co.
InternationaPs newsprint price
which is used as the basis for
prices charged newspaper publish
ers by many other producers, ac-
cording to the testimony of half
dozen witnesses-has been held
down to 500 a ton "for nearly two
years in spite of increased costs
and greatly increased demands" "
Hinman told the investigators. He
boasted that they had held the
price down when they could have
sold for more. 81 can prove to you
a reasonable and moderate price
by comparison with a standard
judicially established" by a Feder-
| al Trade Commission proposal in
1918, Hinman claimed. The COM
plants against newsprint compan-
les have mainly involved charges of
newsprint producers price-fixing
unrelated to supply or demand,
rather than any complaints of
price-gouging, and Humans testi-
mony strengthened the conviction
of some committee members that
the industry operates under sys-
tenn Of private rationing" and
private price-fixing." Both prac-
tices, clearly, are hardly calculat-
ed to maintain the tradition of free
enterprise or calculated to insure
freedom of the press.
Hinman asserted that eff a free
press means plenty of access to
|newsprint, we were never farther
away from danger in this country" ("
He defended the reluctance of his
company and other newsprnit pro-
ducers to expand production. "De-
mand at the moment is all out of
line with historical expectancy and
the basic trend" he insisted.
A sharply differing view was
presented by Robert l.. Smith, as
sistant publisher and general man
ager Of the Los Angeles Daily
News.
There is a shortage of newsprint,
Smith insisted, and "the arithmetic
of the situation is such that liberal
and Independent newspapers will be
the first fatalities" Big newspaper
chains like Hearst and Scripps-
Howard, and dailies like New York
Times, Chicago Tribune, and New
York Daily News, can afford to
buy newsprint mills, Smith said.
AS to fears that increasing cap
acity would leave the newsprint
producers with to much paper.
Smith insisted there's no place for
newsprint demand to go but up"
and that "we've been thinking in
short-term takes on this newsprintt
problem long enough" This was
sharp contrast with the Int'l Paper
Co. presidents hesitancy. "The $64
question:" Hinman said, "is wheth-|
er this present demand for news
print is real or not"
The Los Angeles publisher urged
Reconstruction Finance Corp. loansl
to aid private investors. He saidI
there are people "ready to put upl
$25, 100000 to $30,000,000 to start
a newsprint mill in the United
States" Smith urged development
of US newsprint production tol
avoid complete dependence on Can
ada, which now supplies nearly 85l
percent of the newsprint used inl
US newspapers.
He criticized the newspaper fra
ternity,", and especially the Ameri-
can Newspaper Publishers Assn
for having been too slow in acting
to get larger supplies of paper for
it's members. Smith also urged that
publishers, newsprint producers and
agencies hold meetings
to establish "rules of the road"
He said up to now federal anti
trust actions directed against the
producers have aggra-
waited the shortage. "Cartels and
price-fixing arrangements have
been going on all over the world
and we are just closing our eyes"
by denying it, Smith insisted. To
end this situation, US-owned news