AGRICULTURAL RELIEF 
al 
Commencing several years ago, remarking somewhat upon the 
evolutionary growth of the farm-relief idea, this committee considered 
that the surplus was not the question. The fundamental objective 
varied in the different farm relief bills back yonder; but every farm 
relief bill now, which is presented, including the one I am talking 
about, confesses that the surplus is the question. 
I want to call attention to the evolutionary progress made in farm 
relief. We have gone from a position several years ago, where in 
farm relief, we were talking about various ideas of relief, to the position 
where we are talking now about the same idea; namely, surplus 
disposition and control. This is true, whether the bill is the one we 
are talking about now or any of the others which have come before 
this committee. 
Another point we have progressed along is that in years past, those 
bills which have carried the equalization principle had different 
methods for putting that principle into operation. In the first 
bills carrying the equalization principle the fee was assessed directly 
on the producer and any residue of the fee, after an operation period 
had concluded, was allocated back to the producer. That condition 
in the bills prior to this one gave rise to lots of discussion, much 
controversy, and a great deal of misunderstanding about the equal- 
ization plan for disposing of surpluses. We have elvolved, we have 
progressed, if I may use that latter word, to the point where, in the 
present bill, the individual producer, so far as the equalization fee is 
concerned, does not come into contact with the fee, except that he 
gets the benefit from the stabilization and perhaps a slight hightening 
of the market price of the commodity which he gets for his product. 
In this bill, about which I am speaking, the producer, whether he 
is marketing cotton; peanuts, or what not, does not pay the equali- 
zation fee; he does not get back as a residue any amount of money 
which might be left in the stabilization fund after marketing, or after 
the operation period has been concluded. That is perhaps a part of 
the progress which has been made and which did not exist in the 
former bills. 
Let it be definitely understood that the equalization plan in this 
bill does not collect this fee from the individual producer. The 
equalization fee, or the fee left after the period of operation is con- 
cluded, does not go back to the individual producer, but the fee is 
collected from the commodity at the most convenient point where 
that commodity flows through the direct channels of commerce of 
our country, and if any residue is left in a particular stabilization 
fund, that residue is retained by the Federal Farm Board for use in a 
subsequent operation period of the same commodity. 
Another progress or another point of evolution which farm relief 
has gone through is that several years ago farm relief was started on 
account of a wheat situation in the Pacific Northwest. It was an 
emergency situation which the farm relief bills in those States sought 
to cure. Sometime later the emergency situation removed into the 
mid-West with referemce to corn, there being an emergency situation 
in the production of corn. The producers thereof were desperately 
situated, and the bills at that time were spoken of as a temporary 
way of meeting this emergency situation. . 
Some time later, an emergency situation appeared with reference 
to cotton, either in an overproduction or at least, if not that, a large