How A Black Market Was Crushed
MUNRO, DAVID A.
How A Black Market Was Crushed By DAVID A. MUNRO | 08 ANGELES.—This is a story about *"* OPA, the citrua farmers on the West Coast and the crushing of a huge Black Market. But it is more than...
...j From the first there were two knots that balled up the situation...
...The Hrrald-Tribunt carried a story headlined: "Allies may let Hirohito remain on throne...
...It is...
...Facing bitter and angry Congressmen, the OPA representative* insisted on calling their plan the WFA plan...
...But the tight to put it over, carried on by hardbitten farmers and Voorhis, was fought bitterly—and strangely so—by OPA...
...Under questioning by Voorhis, Economist Smith testified that "for the past six or seven years the jobber's margin, or what we call the'wholesale margin, has varied in California navel orangea between 25 and 40 cents a box...
...Jean Carroll, a former citrus buyer for the Kroger Grocery and Baking Co...
...Persons interested in promoting the campaign being conducted by Us> League are asked to send contributions to the treasurer, Mrs...
...For in this case the OPA was on the side of the forces tending towards a black market while the hero was fighting Congressman Jerry Voorhis...
...This is common sense, but Mr...
...The answer, as Voorhis points out, in to pat the sqaeeze on the un economic middleman who extorts an exorbitant toll on agricultural -products, forcing a terrific spread between I'll price received by the farmer and ta price paid by the consumer...
...Ihe aww regulation," he reported, "reduces prices to the conaasaers as aaoch aa twenty per cent, yet it in creases the amounts paid to the farmer-producers...
...That problem has persisted until today...
...With such outstanding citizens as Judge Edgar Watkins and Dr...
...Under "buy-sell" the government was to buy the entire farm crop and sell it to consumers, thus making a subsidy painless...
...OPA's Frank Gindick stated that "the distributive trade would object very violently to the plan proposed by the War Food Administration...
...One of the currants was the effort to protect commission-men in their high commissions, thus increasing the retail .price...
...Now then," continued Voorhis, "isn't it true that the fact the wholesalers have that much more money has been the direct cause for black market operations in oranges, and has given them a tremendous amount of money, the effect of which has been to break down the structure of the cooperative marketing associations...
...But this was merely an attempt to reduce prices through subsidy, and ultimately taxation on the consumers' pocketbooka rather than any real effort to aqueese the middleman spread...
...The moral of the story is an old one— the need of courageous spokesmen, like) Voorhis, who will battle every step against the plundering attempts of the "wise guys" and for the interests of the little guy...
...The new elements ran the black market in oranges and lemons, threatened the life of the cooperative marketing associations, and began, through mysterious political channels, building wide influence in OPA...
...For California Valencia oranges, Voorhis Exposed OPA Aid to Middlemen in Orange Trade daring the past five yean, it has varied between 25 and 5* cents a box...
...To try to imprison that country in a cordon sanitaire would "create a festering sore...
...Congressmen Voorhis and John Phillips, both of California, then pursued this questioning almost to the doorstep of OPA...
...AN EDITORIAL Make Up Your Mind, Mr...
...For a while Davis hesitated at saying yes to the President's proposal, for he realised the headaches involved...
...Over the past year, the result has" been that in many cases our propaganda has been confused and contradictory...
...But the general enthusiasm convinced Davis that he should tske the job...
...Elmer Davis has tried time and again to clean up this mess, and time and again he Has been balked by subordinates who have been able to exercise wire-pulling influence to stymie Davis...
...The proper attitude to take, Crew said, is a "helpful, cooperative spirit, devoid of vindietiveness . . ." as soon as Japan is purged of her fanatical militarism...
...The State Department has released a document ta • show that Hirohito wanted peace before Pearl Harbor...
...Phillips asked: "Isn't it also a fact that it permits more handlers to come into the picture...
...Mary Raoul Millis, 212 Palmer Building, Atlanta, Georgia...
...Another, a Mr...
...The amount of the subsidy, the OPA men kept insisting, depended upon how much they had to pay the growers for their produce...
...SmbtHy by Imdirtctiom TP Jerry Voorhis, whose devotion to the better aspects of the late lamented New Deal cannot be questioned, could call the War Food Administration citrus order a model for the food industry of the future, he certainly could only deplore the odd patchwork quilt the OPA brought in...
...Those are the gentlemen who have been getting this wide spread of profits," blurted Congressman Oreille Zimmer-' man of Missouri...
...J. F. Gismond, was identified as a buyer for the Atlantic Commission Co., the A&P subsidiary recently indicted for illegally forcing down prices to potato producers in the Southeast...
...Policy Toward Po»» War Japan . . . Joseph C. Grew, former Ambassador to Japan, declared that it is folly to regard Japan as.a permanent outcast from the family of nations...
...Crew's idea that Shintoism which involves Emperor-worship may be utilized to establish a peaceful Japanese government suggests that Hirohito might become the Badoglio of Japan...
...Cullen B. Gosnell as its leaders, the League is steadily gaining influence...
...What had happened was that someone in 1)1'A made an error in the original drafting of the orders applying to citrus...
...The new citrus order, affecting oranges and lemons, of which Voorhis boasted, became operative January 10...
...The witness assented...
...But, faithful to the last to the lost cause, the OPA had written into their tentative buy-sell plan a schedule of lowered prices to producers, a re-affirmation of the spread for distributors...
...The minute ths epic battle of the farmers against OPA, in the matter of the citrua order, was over, Congress. man Jerry Voorhis went on the sir in a special broadcast to the California farmers to tell them what he thought And what he thought was considerable...
...Now, to answer the last queatioa at* Congressman Voorhis, according to the estimates we have made, under the preaent regulation oa all •raagea, oa the average, the wholesale and jobbing margin would be a boat $1.73 per box____" "In ether words," put in Voorhis, "it would be somewhere in the neighborhood of six times, at a conservative estimate five times, what it has his torically been...
...The entire campaign, in fact, is based on the notion that under such a progressive administration the poll tax is out of line with the way things are going...
...absorbed in the huge grabbag that became OWL Each sub-director had his own private pull with the White House or with some powerful government backer...
...Japan must have normal commercial relations with the rest of the world...
...Testimony further showed that, white the easy money was handed cut to wholesalers, relentless pressure waa put on producers to reduce their per cent, laws requiring parity payments to farmers were virtually rewritten by OPA, end that growers and growers' representatives who continued to plead their case before OPA during the teat half of 1943 regularly got the "runaround...
...In many instances Communists and fellow-travelers have wormedTneir way intoJLniportant posts, while small cliques at the top of the division have prevented any real effort to sweep them out...
...Jerry Voorhis enlarged the question by stating "that historically there was an incentive to have as few middlemen handlers as possible . . . (but) under the present regulation, there is every reason to have at, last two handlers...
...The so res pot in the OWI picture is the Overseas division...
...Now MorcjlM for Old TESTIMONY presented by S. R. Smith, former University of California professor, now Deputy Director of the Food Distribution Administration of the War Food Administration, showed the amazing price increase received by the handlers, as a whole, as a result of OPA orders...
...At the end of the year there were two strong politico-commercial currents i mining counter to the efforts of Jerry Voorhis and the citrus industry to clean up the mess...
...In carrying on its campaign the League emphasizes the amazing political progress made by the state under the administration of the present governor, Ellis Arnall...
...Davis still did not have the real power to fire a subordinate or revamp a division without putting the matter up to the President...
...Secondly, there was the stiff-necked, close-mouthed attitude of the Army and Navy public relations services which refused to cooperate in the disclosures of news.' The situation has now erupted...
...With evident pride, the League members point to the repudiation of the 'Talmadge Administration, the great strides that have been made in education, the recent reform in prison administration and the extension of the suffrage to men and women between the ages of 18 and 21...
...Davis is a very contpetent journalist, a liberal, and a good executive...
...The OPA men came fresh from their conferences with ' their "distributive trade" friends, but the Congressmen were ready for them...
...Now it is up to the President...
...On the one hand there were disputed jurisdictions between the Office of Facts and Figures, the Office of Government Reports and the several small offices that wert...
...Either he can back Mr...
...That is right," said the witness...
...But Mr...
...President ppHE current sounbble'in the Office of War Information, which has now been * dumped ipto the lap of the President, illustrates in tiresome fashion the Administration policy of creating an office, and then tying the hands of the man who directs that office...
...The effect of this error was to increase the spread between producer and consumer to the point where a whole new Ktratum of commercial freebooters were let in to the wholesale and jobbing end of the trkde...
...But it is more than a story of "cops and robbers" with the brave OPA rushing in to wipe out the commercial freebooters and protecting the little farmer and the little consumer...
...And yet it is ludicrous that several years after he took over Mr...
...Altogether, the citrusfruit industry was in chaos in 1943...
...Upon cross-examination, they were unable to tell how or where the Government would take possession of the fruit, or how much of a "subsidy" such purchase and sale represented, etc...
...Davis and give him the necessary authority to do his job, and then test the results fairly, or he can make another of his half-hearted compromises which sweeps one man out of the job, puts a new name to the set-up and simply piles up another office on an already tottering structure...
...iismond's connection even with citrus jobbing remained unproved...
...significant to remember that when Elmer Davis, the present director of the Office of War Information, took over the job, the appointment was widely hailed...
...Congressmen continually questioned the OPA officials to find out where in OPA the producers were represented...
...Testimony, extracted piecemeal from OPA representatives themselves, also showed that, before advancing their own plan, the OPA Merred to "the distributive tra)de, with whom we have had quite a bit of contact and consultation on margins...
...and this, rather than subsidies, is the answer to tho food problem...
...Hardly a democratic prospect An Editorial— Against Poll Tax In Georgia *pHE Georgia Electoral Reform League is carrying on a vigorous campaign for the abolition of the poll tax as a prerequisite for voting...
...Then they insisted on attributing its origin to Judge Vinaoa'a office, or to have come from there on the basis of a directive from WFA...
...On the other hand, OPA'a friends in the distributive trade were slated to be amply protected in the OPA plan—and thereby hangs another tale...
...In a last-ditch effort Elmer Davis has sought to assert his authority and bring some coherence out of the rambling OWI structure...
...The other was a thing known as the "buy-sell" program, the mystery of whose origin, coupled with the passion of its advocacy, indicated to observers strong Administration support...
...And it seemed that in the citrus business the closest to a producer was a Mr...
...Neither from Democrat nor Republican was there any aid or encouragement for the hidden subsidy feature...
Vol. 27 • February 1944 • No. 6
