MEAT-PACKER LEGISLATION. COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE, HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, The committee this day met, Hon. Gilbert N. Haugen (chairman) presiding. The CHAIRMAN. Are you ready to go on, Mr. Rainey? Mr. RAINEY. Yes, sir. Mr. Weld, are you ready to proceed? The CHAIRMAN. Are you ready to go on, Mr. Weld? Mr. WELD. Yes, Mr. Chairman. STATEMENT OF MR. L. D. H. WELD, MANAGER, COMMERCIAL RESEARCH DEPARTMENT, SWIFT & CO., CHICAGO. ILL.Resumed. The CHAIRMAN. I think when we closed we were discussing profiteering yesterday. Are there any more questions to be asked in regard to that? Mr. WELD. I had planned to take up that question of profits a little more formally later on. The CHAIRMAN. Later on? Mr. WELD. Yes, sir; I was planning to do that. I think there will be some other things, but just suit your convenience. The CHAIRMAN. I want to ask you a few questions whenever you are ready to discuss that matter. Mr. WELD. All right; I will come back. The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Young, you were asking some questions about cotton; are you through? Mr. YOUNG. Yes, sir; I have finished. The CHAIRMAN. Are there any other questions on the subject that we were discussing? Mr. Marsh, did you want to ask any questions? Mr. MARSH. I want to ask some questions on profits later. The CHAIRMAN. Then you may proceed, Mr. Weld. Mr. WELD. In connection with the Federal Trade Commission's report, I want to call attention to the list of commodities handled by the packers reported in Part 1 of the Federal Trade Commission's report, pages 96 to 102. I think Mr. Chaplin has a report The CHAIRMAN. Just a moment. that he wants to file with the committee. Mr. CHAPLIN. I will file that later. The CHAIRMAN. All right. Mr. WELD. There are listed on these pages some 639 commodities that it is said the packers handle. My only point in bringing this up is that by making out a list in this way it gives an entirely exaggerated idea of the number of commodities handled by the packers. In the first place, of these 639 commodities listed over half of them are meats and meat products, and over 70 in this list are supplies which Swift & Co. purchases for its own use and through bookkeeping devices transfers from central headquarters to various plants and branch houses and which are not sold to the outside at all.` This list contains many ridiculous duplications such as "sardines" and "canned sardines," they both appear in the list; "flour" and "wheat flour" both appear in this list, and "pork chitterlings" and "chitterlings," which are the same things, appear as two separate items in this list. Mr. MARSH. May I ask a question? Mr. WELD. Just as soon as I get through with this point you can ask questions on it. The Trade Commission list also includes beef tongue, tongue fresh, tongue cured, and so forth, as separate items. Of course, using that same method of listing the commodities it might have added under "tongue," trimmed tongue, untrimmed tongue, and so forth. That would have helped them out considerably in swelling the list. The idea seems to have been to make as long a list as possible. You will find in the list 37 items under the head of sausage. There is sausage, dry sausage, sausage meat, and so forth. That includes 37 items. It also includes this item: "Brass castings for recoil mechanism in heavy ordnance." That is a product outside of the packing business, in which an official of one of the packers owns a little stock. Of course, many hundred commodities might have been added on this same basis. The Federal Trade Commission tries to defend itself in putting in this long list of commodities by saying that it was compiled from the price lists of the packers. That is undoubtedly true. Probably the list is technically correct, but the only possible reason for putting in such a list was to grossly exaggerate the number of commodities, handled by the packers, and I hold that it is not a reliable list at all to give a definite idea of the products handled by the packers. Are there any questions on that point? Mr. YOUNG. If this list has been too much extended, continuing such an item as the tongue item, for instance, I will ask you what your statement would be as to the commodities that are really handled? Mr. WELD. Well, of course, in the first place, all products that are meat products or animal by-products, I think, I would have listed and subsequently, if I were called on for a complete list of the commodities handled-these are strictly packing-house products. Mr. YOUNG. That part I do not care so much about. Mr. YOUNG. But the outside products that are not? Mr. WELD. Speaking only for Swift & Co., if I were asked to enumerate what Swift & Co. handles outside of the meat products and animal by-products, I would say that it handled canned goods, which includes both canned meats and canned fruits and vegetables. Mr. ANDERSON. And fish? Mr. WELD. Yes, sir. Of course, we could list any number of items under canned fruits and vegetables. They are all listed here. We consider that as one class of commodities that we handle. Then we handle lard and butter substitutes and cottonseed oil, which are not strictly packing house products or by-products. We handle a little dry and salt fish. Anything else? Mr. CHAPLIN. Eggs. Mr. WELD. Butter, eggs, cheese, and poultry produce. Mr. YOUNG. You do not handle wheat? Mr. WELD. No, sir. The different packers vary in the commodities. That, of course, is not brought out by the Federal Trade Commission's list. Armour has gone much further than any other packer in handling cereals, rice, and coffee. Mr. YOUNG. The Federal Trade Commission when they are dealing with the five packers, it may be that your concern would not handle some of these items and other concerns would handle them? Mr. WELD. Yes, sir. Mr. YOUNG. When they are making a list they probably do not differentiate, and if they find that any of the five packers handle them, of course in making up the list, as it were, it would be fair for them to say that? Mr. WELD. In the first place, they should have differentiated some between the different packers, but even in making up a combined list of all the packers I do not think that these duplications such as "sardines" and "canned sardines," and so forth, should appear, things of that sort, and supplies like brick, cement, and so forth, that we buy only for our own use. I do not think those should have been included in the list without, at least, some word of explanation, bought for their own use and not sold to outsiders, and even though possibly one or two packers may occasionally sell some of that stuff to the outside, they are not in the regular business, and it gives totally wrong impression as to the number of commodities handled. My thought is that this gives a vastly exaggerated notion of the number of commodities handled by the packers, regularly handled by the packers. Mr. ANDERSON. As a matter of fact, the report of the Federal Trade Commission was deficient as to a considerable number of articles handled by some members of the Big Five? Mr. WELD. I just said that they could have added a great many more, following out this same method of listing commodities. Mr. ANDERSON. For instance, they did not make any reference to Wilson & Co.'s sporting goods line. Mr. WELD. No; I do not think it would have been fair to include them. They are not sold by the packing house, they are not sold through the selling organization of the packing house. Mr. Wilson is interested in practically an outside business. Mr. ANDERSON. It does not include a great many of the Armour products? Mr. WELD. I doubt if any of those have been overlooked. They have each item listed under canned goods, condiments, and so forth. Mr. ANDERSON. Are all of the 138 products, more or less, specified in the consent decree, handled by one or the other of the Big Five? Mr. WELD. I do not know. I think they probably are. The CHAIRMAN. There are about 200; I just counted them. Mr. ANDERSON. What I am getting at is whether this decree intends only to prohibit the Big Five from engaging in outside lines in which they are now engaged or whether it was intended to go beyond that and prohibit them from engaging in, for instance, wholesale |