700 GENERAL FARM PROGRAM 



Mr. Murray. I do not know what the gentleman's name is, but 

 I want to teh him, so far as we are concerned, to try it out on wheat 

 first and then we may want to have them try it out on hogs, because 

 wheat has weevils in it and it does not keep so good sometimes, and 

 if it works out with wheat, then try it out on hogs. 



Mr. Andresen. The gentleman from Tennessee has suggested 

 something about the speculators dominating the marketing of these 

 farm products. Of course, none of us is in favor of that. 



Mr. Hughes. No. 



Mr. Andresen. The facts are that on February 4, 1948, a year 

 ago, the Government decided not to buy any more grain. They had 

 been purchasing at least one-third of the wheat in the country, and 

 they announced on February 4, they were going to stop buying grain, 

 and the price went down 10 cents a bushel for 5 to 6 days, which demon- 

 strated to me that the Government was the dominating influence in 

 the market to maintain price, which, of course, was their authorized 

 purpose. But the buying on the part of the Government did demon- 

 strate, when the Government stopped buying, the price went down and 

 the bottom really dropped out of the market. 



Mr. Hughes. That is right. 



Air. Andresen. I think that you, as a wheat grower, recognize 

 that fully. 



Mr. Hughes. That is right. 



Mr. Sutton. You realize the Government was trying to help the 

 farmer in buying, whereas the man in the market is trying to help 

 No. 1 — himself. 



Mr. Andresen. No. Let me suggest to the gentleman from 

 Tennessee that the Government was buying grain, buying wheat, to 

 supply the demand in other countries for which the program was 

 authorized by Congress. 



Mr. Sutton. That is right. 



Mr. Andresen. But my contention is and always has been that as 

 long as the Government has been in the progi'am of buying, such 

 buying has dominated the market irrespective of the pm-pose for which 

 it was authorized, and the buying on the part of the Government was 

 so great that it dominated the price and, when the Government stopped 

 buying, the price went down and the bottom fell out of the market. 



Mr. White. You would not mean to imply by that, Air. Andresen, 

 would you, that any Government program that is effective as a loan 

 program or purchase program, if it provides protection for the entire 

 crop, would be ineffective; you do not mean to imply that, do you? 



Mr. Andresen. Of course, if we have a support program here on 

 the price for the entire crop irrespective of the size of the crop and 

 without any controls, of course, the Government will be left holding 

 the entire crop if the support price is high enough. 



Mr. White. But that has never been the case. In the case of 

 cotton or these other commodities, they get a reasonable amount of it 

 and try to effect a balance, and it stabilizes the price. 



Air. Andresen. On cotton — I know that is what the gentleman is 

 particularly interested in— if we have an 18,000,000 or 20,000,000 

 bale crop this year, with our country only being able to use 8,000,000 

 or 9,000,000 bales, the Government would be owning the rest of it, 

 and the only way they could get rid of it would be for the Congress 

 to appropriate the money to send it to the rest of the world. 



