AGRICULTURAL RELIEF House oF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE, Wednesday, February 8, 1928. The committee met, pursuant to adjournment, at 10 o’clock a. m., Hon. Gilbert N. Haugen (chairman) presiding. The CuarMaN. The committee will be in order. (The committee thereupon proceeded to the consideration of H. R. 10568. which is as follows:) TH. R. 10568, Seventieth Congress, first session] . BILL To foster agriculture and to stabilize the prices obtained for agricultural com- modities by providing for the issuance of export debentures upon the exportation eof such commodities Be it enucted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, DECLARATION OF POLICY SectioN 1. It is hereby declared to be the policy of Congress— (a) To afford to those agricultural commodities of which surpluses above jomestic requirements are produced in the United States the same degree of protection which is afforded to industry in the United States by the tariff, and to prevent such surpluses above domestic requirements from unduly depressing the prices obtained for such commodities, and from causing undue and excessive fluctuations in the markets for such commodities, and to these ends— {b) To provide for the payment, upon exports of such commodities and of products of such commodities, of export premiums, by means of export de- bentures, sufficient to equalize the difference between the cost of producing such ommodities in the United States and the cost of producing such commodities in competing foreign countries. NATIONAL ENYPORT DERENTURE BOARD Sec. 2. A national export debenture board is hereby created, which shall ronsist of the following members ex officio: The Secretary of Agriculture, who shall be chairman; the Secretary of Commerce; and the Secretary of the Treasurv. Two members shall constitute a quorum. GENERAL POWERS Sec. 3. The board— (a) Shall maintain its principal office in the District of Columbia and such ther offices in the United States as it deems necessary. (b) Shall have an official seal which shall be judicially noticed. {c) Shall make an annual report to the President and the Congress of the United States. . » (d) May make such regulations as ure necessary to execute the functions rested in it by this act. (e) May (1) appoint and fix the salaries of a secretary and such experts and, ln accordance with the classification act of 1923 and subject to the provisions of the civil-service laws, such other officers and employees; and (2) make such expenditures, as may be necessary for the execution of the functions vested in the board \