AGRICULTURAL RELIEF 
33 
Mr. PurNeLL. But that is not the point. If we are going to stop 
right there, and if that is all you are going to say to your farm group, 
all you are going to say to this committee, that is one thing; but if 
you are going to go ahead and add to that statement that we can not 
cet it and we know we can not get it, then does it not necessarily 
follow that we ought to then concern ourselves with the next impor- 
tant question, whether or not we will try to get anything. That is 
the thing that we are up against right here. I repeat that it is a 
serious and most serious question for us to decide. 
Mr. Gray. It is very serious. 
Mr. PurNELL. And it does not mean that any man that supported 
this bill around this table will change in any degree the sentiment 
or belief that he has in that measure. 
Mr. Gray. It is a very serious situation. It is serious for the farm 
representatives, for the farm groups, and it is serious for the member- 
ship of this committee. We know that. 
Mr. PurneLL. I want to say, as I said to you privately, this com- 
mittee has a very high regard for your judgment and advice and for 
the advice of your associates, who have come down here and helped us 
through the evolution of this bill. I was just thinking, while we 
have been discussing in the last few days this bill, how crude was 
the very beginning, when we had the old script plan which we pro- 
posed to work through the post office; how ridiculous it seems to-day. 
We have gone through a process of evolution here. There is not, of 
course, anybody here who is going to turn his back on it. But that 
is not the question. It is not a question of whether we have forsaken 
the principles of the bill we have been fighting for. It is a fact that 
we are up against a practical proposition, and that is whether we 
will go home with something or nothing. 
Mr. Gray. What is the practical proposition? 
Mr. PurneLL. Whether we will go home with something or nothing, 
and with me it is also a question of whether we will o home with 
something that is worth anything. 
Mr. Gray. The practical proposition is not whether we will go 
home with something or nothmg. The practical proposition which is 
disturbing many people, but not particularly disturbing the farm 
groups, is whether or not there is going to be a veto of whatever farm 
relief measure comes out of this Congress. 
Mr. PrrNELL. You know there will be a veto, don’t vou? 
Mr. Gray. I do not know it. 
Mr. Pur~EeLL. There has been some suggestion here by inference, 
if not by direct statement, that some of the members of the com- 
mittee have assurance that the President or the administration wants 
us to do this thing without the equalization fee in it. I have not 
talked with anybody about it. Nobody has invited me to do one 
thing or the other. Whatever has been said has come from within 
this committee. I do not know what the President would do if we 
sent this bill down to him without the equalization fee in it. I 
have no knowledge whatever, directly or indirectly. So that it is 
not a question, as was intimated by somebody, that we are forsaking 
the principles of our bill and trying to put through something some- 
body else wants. Nobody has said anything to me about it, and I 
don’t think anybody has said anything to any.of the members of the 
committee.