HOW FALSE CHARGES WERE MADE 



Mr. Manahan (counsel for the farmers). — We will 

 see if it is within the power. 



Mr. Mercer. — ^This is a private corporation, organ- 

 ized under the statutes, and purely private. 



What is equally remarkable is the revelation 

 that the inside control exercised the right 

 to exclude any person, even when armed 

 with a membership, from any actual partici- 

 pation in the management of the Chamber. 

 This is part of the examination of Mr. Mc- 

 Hugh, before referred to: 



Question. — If a man buys from any individual holder 

 a membership, that does not entitle him to a place on 

 the board or the floor? 



Answer. — No sir. Membership in the Chamber of 

 Commerce is a life membership, as in a fraternal order 

 or church. 



Another startling revelation was about a 

 matter of such primitive importance in com- 

 mercial honesty as the false balances, long 

 ago said to be an abomination to the Lord, 

 but subsequently proved to be quite other- 

 wise to the grain trade in North Dakota. 

 There was, to begin with, the fact that in an 

 average year about five hundred thousand 

 bushels of wheat in that state would be taken 

 to the country elevators and apparently never 

 reach any market. Between the farmer's 

 wagon at the elevator side and the final ac- 

 counting it most strangely vanished, took 

 wings, departed, or marched away. The farm- 



71 



