282

AGRICULTURAL RELIEF

Now, you said that a fee of $5 a bale would have been fair. That
would make $90,000,000.

Then, taking the $1,080,000,000 from the $1,350,000,000, leaves
$270,000,000 more for the cotton crop in the first instance than in
the other. In view of the fact that the cotton farmers pay the
equilization fee, it would be fair to deduct what they had paid of their
own pockets for that fee.. That would leave you then $180,000,000.
Where does your $180,000,000 come from, in the last analyses?

Mr. Kingore. That $180,000,000 would have been distributed
over the entire production, and all of the farmers would have gotten
the benefit of that in proportion to their production.

Mr. Kercaam. Would it not be spread all over the people of the
United States who consumed cotton?

Mr. KiLcore. Well, it would have gone to the producers of cotton
directly, I think.

Mr. Doron, But it would have gone to the producers of cotton.
But where is the point it would have gone back to?

Mr. KiLcore. It would have gone into the channels of trade.

Mr. Kercaam. The channels of trade means eventually all the
people who have consumed cotton?

Mr. KiLGore. Yes. |

Mr. Kercaam. They would have paid, then, $180,000,000 to the
growers of cotton?

Mr. KiLGorE. Yes.

Mr. Kercuam. That was collected through the agency of a board
set up by the United States Government?

Mr. KILGORE. Yes.

Mr. Kercaam. $180,000,000. I am glad to have that point,
because under the plan in my bill all the people of the United States
would have been assessed $80,000,000 for cotton instead of $180,000,-
000. I was getting back, of course, to the illustration we hear a
great deal about, that we must oppose the debenture plan because it
is a subsidy. I just wanted to call attention to the fact that the
people of the United States pay $180,000,000 in one instance and
$80,000,000 1n the other.

Mr. FuLmer. May I ask the gentleman from Michigan right on
that point: I gathered from your remarks, then, that because of
holding this cotton at, say 15 cents, a fair price, which would be a
4 cents above the low price, that it would come out of the consumer
of the manufactured goods?

Mr. KercaaM. Yes.

Mr. FuLMER. As a matter of fact, for your own information, last
year, 1926, when we produced 18,000,000 bales of cotton, the trade
in the United States and for export took 19,000,000 bales of cotton;
and because of the short crop for the last year they are feeding the
1926 cotton back into the market this fall not at 15 cents but at 20
cents and 22 cents a pound, either in cotton or manufactured goods,
bo the consumer; and if we had been able to have held this price at
ound 1 gt cents it would not have cost the consumer a
th 1d cost the consumer; in fact, it would not cost
Rumer bs much as the consumer had to pay, because this cheap

le to pee onto ho hands 2 the speculators and mills that were
poke Into the wpa 7s) os a short crop and they are feeding it
short crop at high prices.