AGRICULTURAL DISCONTENT 



riod on the Chicago market from 48 to 58 cents. This rise was attributed 

 to the inflationary proposals, the imminence of the farm-emergency meas- 

 ures, and the poor conditions of the winter wheat crop. Another curious 

 complication was the disparity between the domestic and world price. 

 May wheat at 58 cents in Chicago was actually eight or nine cents higher 

 than wheat in Liverpool. 42 



On May 10 the bill had passed both houses, and on May 12 President 

 Roosevelt signed it. 43 The Agricultural Adjustment Act was an omnibus 

 measure, possessing as predicted "all the earmarks of a document hastily 

 drawn to the specifications of divergent and conflicting groups." 44 The 

 essential features of the act provided for the refinancing of farm mort- 

 gages, the raising of farm prices by government controls, and the placing 

 of greater powers in the hands of the President for the purpose of not 

 increasing the quantity of money but decreasing the gold value of the 

 dollar. These three measures were introduced at different times. The first 

 two had the approval of the President, but not the third, which was in- 

 tended to head off demands for money inflation that came especially 

 from Farmers' Union quarters. 45 



Section two of the A.A.A. declared that its policy was to seek to estab- 

 lish and maintain such a balance between production and consumption as 

 would re-establish farm prices at a level that would give farm commodities 

 a purchasing power equivalent to that commanded over the base period. 

 The original act applied to seven "basic" commodities: wheat, cotton, 

 corn, hogs, rice, tobacco, and milk and its products; and the base period 

 for all these, except tobacco, was the prewar period of August, 1909, to 

 July, 1914. The base period for tobacco August, 1919, to July, 1929 

 was selected because, due to the rapid changes in tobacco habits, the pre- 

 war period was no longer held to represent conditions in the industry. 



Two sets of powers were conferred upon the Secretary of Agriculture, 

 one dealing with voluntary production adjustments through contracts 



42. "Wheat Prices," Business Wee\ (April 19, 1933), p. 12; "Survey of the Wheat 

 Situation," Food Research Institute, Stanford University, Wheat Studies, IX (Sep- 

 tember, 1933), pp. 369-70. 



43. The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt (9 vols., New 

 York, 1938), II, 79. 



44. Business Wee\ (March 29, 1933), p. 3. 



45. Davis, Wheat and the AAA, p. 30. 



