312 GENERAL FARM PROGRAM 



Air. O'vSuLLivAN. In other words, the farm group has been a rather 

 helpk^ss class and there were dozens of men in business whose chief 

 occupation in hfe was to ".farm the farmers." Is that not true? 



Secretary Brannan. That is right. 



Mr. O'SuLLivAN. So that is why we have to have a farm program, 

 because, farming is a basic hne of work. Our whole economy is 

 geared to farming and we have to protect the farmer against the 

 fellow who wants lo "farm the farmer." It has been suggested here 

 that it is something unholy and something which destroys spiritual 

 values, to give the farmer any aid or financial protection. I just 

 wanted to make this observation. I do not put it in the form of a 

 question. I want to observe that it was not considered unholy and 

 it was not considered a program to destroy spiritual values when all 

 of the infant industries of this country were being subsidized and given 

 protection. Or was it? If it was I was just wondering if that was 

 why the big corporations and the big industries which were so pro- 

 tected lost all of their spiritual values and became so unholy. I 

 doubt it. 



Now, Mr. Secretary, if hogs came into the market now, would 

 support be limited to 1,800 units? 



Secretary Brannan. No, sir. 



Mr. O'SuLLivAN. Then a couple of questions referring to the 

 average price: 



In arriving at your commodities' national average price, would you 

 consider only the sale of the compliance part of the commodity oi- 

 would you also take into consideration the sale of that part of the 

 commodity not in compliance? 



Secretary Brannan. You would take into consideration the sale 

 of all commodities of the class in the market place but the compiler 

 would be the only one who would benefit from the production pay- 

 ment. 



Mr. O'SuLLivAN. And would you consider the sale of that part 

 of the commodity^ which would be in excess of the quota or total 

 units? I guess your answer would be "Yes," would it not? 



Secretary Brannan. I think it would, Mr. O'Sullivan. 



Mr. O'Sullivan. Would you have a separate support price for 

 different grades of cattle? 



Secretary Brannan. I think there is some possibility that you 

 would. Of course, that is a problem which we did not go into in 

 great length because we would have to give the answer to it today 

 if cattle were being supported today. 



Mr. O'Sullivan. I have in mind that there is a great difference 

 in cattle, having been reared on a combination farm and cattle ranch 

 and being pretty close to the livestock industry as a lawyer. Some 

 cattle are not worth very much money. They may be off color, shape 

 or breed in which event they may not bring the same amount of money 

 as higher grades of cattle do. 



I was wondering if you would have different support prices for 

 different grades of cattle and who would do the grading and how 

 you would ever get it down so you could have a workable program 

 without grade supervision. 



Secretary Brannan. There are established grades now. I am not 

 purporting to dispose of all the intricacies of the problem. There are 

 now grades in the market place and the vendor of the animal in the 



