802 GENERAL FARM PROGRAM 



Mr. CooLEY. So, rather than pursue the compensatory payment 

 plan, knowing that he must support prices, you think it woukl be 

 better for him to go to the packing plant and buy hogs there, put 

 them in storage, and withdraw them from the market? 



Mr. PicKELL. I think he should, first of all, try to get the farmer to 

 market hogs at a lower weight. I think he should encourage, by 

 every possible means, the exportation of pork and lard. I think he 

 should try to get through this Congress • 



Mr. CooLEY. Let me interrupt you there just a minute. He is 

 charged with a definite, fixed responsibility by Congress itself. 



Mr. Pickell. Yes, sir. 



Mr. CooLEY. And, unless we change the law, he has no alternative 

 other than to go into the market and buy live hogs from the farmer or 

 go to the packer and buy hogs there. 



Mr. Pickell. He was also instructed by Congress to do that back 

 in 1944. When he came out, he said he cannot buy hogs at that price, 

 that it would do no good, that the packers have not the space to store 

 them, and he would not have, either, and he did not do anything at 

 all to support the price at that time. 



Mr. Cooley. I still think that does not answer my question. If 

 Congress has given him that responsibility — and we assume he will 

 execute the laws w^e have enacted — as compared with the method he 

 has now, that is, buying hogs, putting them in storage, and taking 

 them off the market, you think he should not do that? 



Mr. Pickell. He has to do whatever Congress instructs him to do, 

 but I think "No." 



Mr. Cooley. You do not even approve that program? 



Mr. Pickell. That is right. 



Mr. Cooley. And you think the livestock men of the country 

 generally agree with you in that regard? 



Mr. Pickell. I have read into the record from their testimony. I 

 am going to put their letters into the record. 



Mr. Cooley. I know you have given us your individual group. 

 My question now applies generally to the livestock producers of the 

 coimtry. You think they do not want any support program on hogs? 



Mr. Pickell. Accordingly to our survey, they do not. 



Mr. Cooley. All right, sir; that is all. 



Mr. Murray. Mr. Pickell, what disturbs me is an editorial in the 

 Washington Post today that goes on to say: 



Retail food prices, to be sure, are 7 percent lower than they were at the highly 

 inflated level of last July. But they are only a fraction of 1 percent below the 

 index for March 1948. * * * Retail meat prices also advanced in March to 

 a level slightly above that of the previous year, despite substantial declines in 

 livestock and wholesale meat prices. 



In other words, the fact that hog prices coidd be cut in two during 

 last year is no indication, if you put the Brannan plan into effect, that 

 the consumer is going to get any particular benefit out of the cut — 

 out of the money appropriated for that purpose? 



Mr. Pickell. I think that if the farmers took their livestock and 

 gave it to the packers for nothing, you still would not have cheap meat. 



Mr. Murray, There are three things, then, before we get into 

 going out of the money. We can at least try to get England or any 

 country that wants to buy our suiplus pork at support prices, that 

 would make sense, would it not? 



