AGRICULTURAL RELIEF 
Mr. Morgan. I have always been rather afraid of fixing the price 
on any commodity. 
Mr. KercuaM. There is no fixing of the price involved in the idea 
some of the rest of us are somewhat interested in; there is no price 
fixing in 1t whatsoever. We are interested in a better price, and if 
a better price is not what is aimed at by all the people who are ap- 
pearing here in connection with farm relief legislation, of course, 
then, I have misunderstood them. It is an effort to put the farmer 
in this picture that has been drawn here so vividly of the special 
privileges in price matters which have been given to other of our 
olks. 
Mr. Morgan. Our idea is that anything that is done should be 
done in such a way that the farmer will handle his own business. 
i can tell you in a few words just how this McNary-Haugen bill 
will operate for our dark tobacco. Our normal crop 1s 250,000,000 
pounds. If we have a normal crop, we get out of that 250,000,000 
pounds about 50,000,000 pounds that is hard to sell. It will be 
bought mostly by speculators and gradually sold out. And so the 
surplus will be about 50,000,000 pounds. 
We, of course, will meet with the board here at Washington and 
determine what the equalization fee is to be, and in my opinion for 
a normal crop 1 cent a pound would be sufficient. If it were 1 cent 
a pound it would not cost anything, the way we look at it, to collect 
the fee. Every buyer of tobacco is registered and numbered, and 
has to make a report to the Treasury Department every month 
showing the number of pounds of tobacco he bought that month and 
the kind he bought. Under this bill he would merely write his check 
for 1 cent a pound for all the tobacco he bought, and send that to 
the Treasury along with his report, and that in turn would be sent 
over to the board. The association would, of course, pay over 1 cent 
a pound for the tobacco they received. So at the end of the operating 
period for that year you would have from your 1 cent a pound 
$2,500,000 collected without setting up any new machinery or em- 
ploying new men, or at a dime’s cost to anybody. 
Mr. ANDrESEN. The proposition is that the buyer shall pay, not 
the producer? 
Mr. Morgan. Ther je wr 
much easier to dc 
is already set up. 
Mr. ANDRESEN. 
production? 
Mr. Morgan. I au not know that it would affect production. 
Mr. ANDRESEN. One claim in connection with the equalization fee 
is that it is calculated to cut down production. 
Mr. Morgan. Oh, if you increase production you would have to 
increase the fee to 2 or 3 cents. The amount would be determined 
by the size of the crop. 
Mr. Apkins. The farmer will soon learn about that. 
Mr. Morean. Yes; the farmer will soon find out about that. 
Under this bill we would have this 50,000 pounds surplus. We 
would meet with the board to determine a fair price. A fair price 
under normal times would be about 10 cents a pound for the kind of 
tobacco that we know will be left over. We can sell all of our wrap- 
pers, all of our high-grade leaf and snuff tobacco and all of the trash.