January 4, 1918] 



SCIENCE 



sary increase in production, to control dis- 

 tribution, and to hold prices at proper 

 levels. If the war is to be carried to a suc- 

 cessful conclusion the production of the 

 United States must be enormously in- 

 creased. The distribution of the essential 

 commodities must be such as to meet the 

 various needs in proportion to their im- 

 portance. The prices to the people of the 

 United States and the Allies must be rea- 

 sonable else extortion will continue on a 

 vast scale both from ourselves and our as- 

 sociates; but the law of supply and de- 

 mand and competition did none of these 

 things — even the increase in production 

 was inadequate. 



REGULATORY MEASURES NECESSARY 



To remedy the situation the President 

 asked Congress for one regulatory measure 

 after another. The crisis was such that 

 these requests have all been met. The re- 

 sult is a most amazing series of regiilatory 

 enactments. These are as follows: The 

 food and fuel administration act, the ship- 

 ping act, the espionage act, the trading 

 with the enemy act, and the priority act. 

 Also the "War Industries Board and the 

 Federal Court have instituted regulatory 

 measures without congressional action. 



It is my purpose very briefly and inade- 

 quately to summarize some of the things 

 which have been done under these regu- 

 latory measures and, following such sum- 

 mary, to discuss the principles involved. 

 All of the measures enacted by Congress 

 grant the powers to the President. These 

 he has in some cases at first exercised, but 

 later delegated them to agencies created 

 as authorized by the acts. After such 

 agents have been created, the President has 

 issued proclamations from time to time in 

 accordance with the recommendations of 

 the several agencies. In the succeeding 

 pages, for the sake of brevity, no discrim- 



ination is made between the exercise of the 

 l)owers by the President directly and their 

 exercise by his agents. 



The Food Administration Act 

 Under the Food Administration Act, the 

 President appointed Herbert Hoover, Food 

 Administrator. The latter organized the 

 Food Administration. A licensing system 

 has been introduced for all essential food 

 commodities. Manufacturers, wholesalers, 

 and other distributors are required to take 

 out a license in order to conduct their busi- 

 ness. Under the terms of these licenses, 

 hoarding and speculation are to be elimi- 

 nated and only fair and reasonable profits 

 or charges are to be made for .services ren- 

 dered. Thus the charge which the miller 

 may make for the manufacture of flour and 

 the margin which the jobber may take for 

 its distribution is definitely limited. 



The law confines the control of the Food 

 Administration to the zone between the orig- 

 inal producers, that is, the farmers and the 

 farmers associations and the retailers with 

 a business less than $100,000 per annum. 

 The manufacturers and the wholesalers 

 are directly reached by regulation; the 

 farmers and retailers only indirectly. 

 "While the base price of the producer is not 

 controlled, intermediate additions are, so 

 that the product reaches the retailer with 

 only a fair increment added to the price of 

 the producer. The public is informed in 

 regard to the pi'iee which the retailer pays 

 and what would be a fair price which he 

 should charge. 



Scarcely less important than the regula- 

 tion of prices is the control of distribu- 

 tion. The Food Administration decides 

 upon the amount of the essential commodi- 

 ties which go abroad and to what country 

 they are to go. Not only so, but he con- 

 trols the home distribution, and if advis- 

 able, even to the extent of the purposes for 



