MCNARY-HAUGEN MOVEMENT 393 



the Jardine plan would do was to add "a few extra experts on coopera- 

 tive marketing to the Department of Agriculture." 5 



As a further concession, the national administration in March raised 

 the tariff on butter from eight to twelve cents. In April the National 

 Industrial Conference Board, representing the business interests, stressed 

 the need for farm relief, and the McNary-Haugen, the Curtis-Aswell, and 

 the Fess-Tincher bills were reported to the House. Many compromises 

 had been imposed on the McNary-Haugen bill by representatives who 

 were uncertain how their constituents would receive it. Needless to say, 

 the bill was defeated a second time in the House by a vote of 212 to 167. 

 Both the Tincher and Aswell bills, which had been offered as substitute 

 measures, also were rejected. In the vote the McNary-Haugen bill picked 

 up sixteen votes in the South, but lost an equal number in the West and 

 on the Pacific Coast. 56 



In mid-June, Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon came into the 

 fight. Mellon, in response to the requests of Representatives Haugen and 

 Dickinson for his opinion on the measure, wrote that if the bill were to 

 become law we would have "the unusual spectacle of the American 

 consuming public paying a bonus to the producers of the five major 

 agricultural commodities." 57 His statements were held to have been the 

 position of the administration and gave the farmers of the corn and wheat 

 belts an additional target at which to aim. 



On June 24 the Senate rejected the McNary-Haugen bill by a vote of 

 45 to 39. The vote in the Senate showed even less southern support than 

 did the vote in the House. 58 The following day President Coolidge en- 

 dorsed the marketing bill of Senator Fess, which administration critics 

 called "a scheme not for the relief of the farmer, but for the relief of a 

 frightened administration. . . ." 5 



If the administration thought that it had squelched the McNary-Haugen 



55. Pioneer Press, July i, 1926. 



56. Black, in American Economic Review, XVIII (September, 1928), pp. 264, 

 408-11. 



57. The New International Year Boo^, 1926, p. 752; L. T. Beman, Farm Relief 

 (New York, 1927), p. 170; a complete text of the letter is found here. 



58. The New International Year Boof(, 1926, p. 750; Black, in American Eco- 

 nomic Review, XVIII (September, 1928), pp. 264-65. The Fess bill authorized a 

 revolving fund of $100,000,000 to handle the surplus. 



59. Pioneer Press, July i, 1926. 



