REPORT OF ADMINISTRATION OF GRAIN FUTURES ACT. 



United States Department of Agriculture, 



Grain Futures Administration, 

 Washington, D. (7., September 20, 1923. 



Sir: I respectfully^ transmit herewith my annual report for the 

 Grain Futures Administration for the fiscal year ending June 30, 

 1923. 



Respectfully yours, 



Chester Morrill, 

 Assistant to the Secretary. 

 Hon. Henry C. Wallace, 

 Secretary of Agriculture. 



As stated in the annual report for the fiscal year ending Juno 

 30, 1922, for the Administration of the Grain Future Trading Act 

 of August 24, 1921, that act was found unconstitutional in certain 

 resj)ects by the Supreme Court of the United States on May 15, 

 1922, and there was pending in Congress at the close of the fiscal 

 year a bill framed under the interstate-commerce power of Con- 

 gress to take the place of the previous statute. This new bill was 

 approved by the President on September 21, 1922, with a provision 

 making it operative on November 1, 1922. The present law is desig- 

 nated as the "grain futures act," instead of the "future trading 

 act." the name by which the former statute was known. 



The Chicago Board of Trade and the future exchanges at Min- 

 neapolis, Kansas City, St. Louis, and Duluth instituted suits in 

 the Federal courts in their respective districts to test the consti- 

 tutionality' of the new statute. Temporary stays of the enforcement 

 of the law as to these exchanges were granted pending hearings, and 

 the suits of all of these exchanges except the Chicago Board of 

 Trade were held in abeyance awaiting the outcome of its case. The 

 other exchanges did not contest, but the Toledo Produce Exchange 

 announced its discontinuance of trading in grain futures as a pro- 

 test against the new law. An answer was filed to the bill of com- 

 plaint of the Chicago Board of Trade, and when the case came to be 

 heard the lower Federal court dismissed the bill of complaint and 

 denied the application for a restraining order. An appeal was 

 taken by the Chicago Board of Trade to the Supreme Court of 

 the United States, and a stay of enforcement of the law was granted 

 pending the decision by that court. Tn an opinion handed down by 

 Chief Justice Taft on April 16, 1923, the Supreme Court upheld 

 the constitutionality of the statute, and referred to its former deci- 



689 



