GRAZING FEES GUARANTY PRICE ON WHEAT. 20 



Mr. TiNCHER. Mr. Clement, I do not like to ask you for anything 

 you have not already stated, but you have had this matter up with 

 Mr. Barnes, have you not? 



Mr. Clement. Yes, sir. 



Mr. TiNCHEE. That is all I wanted to ask you. If you want to tell 

 lis about it, all right. 



Mr. CuEMENT. That does not embarrass me a bit — not one particle. 

 We conceived the idea that if we could come to this committee with 

 an indorsement from the Grain Corporation it would be a good thing 

 and that it would have weight with this committee. So we went up 

 to ISTew York and we called on Mr. Barnes and we laid our case be- 

 fore him. He told us very courteously that we ought to have been 

 advised, that we ought to have known that this legislation was pend- 

 ing in Congress, and that they had it in mind to fix the price of 

 wheat. And when we showed him his letters and the communications 

 from Mr. Hoover and from his own office, why, he intiraated that 

 we ought not to have believed what he said. 



Mr. McLaughlin of Nebraska. That is probably correct. [Laugh- 

 ter.] 



Mr. Clement. That was the only conclusion we could reach. 



Mr. McLaughlin of Nebraska. But you gentlemen did not know 

 that at the time you received the communications ? 



Mr. Clement. No; we felt that they were given to us in good 

 faith. We realize now they were sent to us to mislead us. We did 

 not know that the Grain Corporation and these men that Mr. Hoover 

 had chosen for his assistants had come to Washington and conferred 

 with one another and agreed it was necessary and proper to fix the 

 price of wheat for 1917, and that it was necessary and proper also 

 to conceal the fact that they intended to do it. 



Mr. TiNCHER. As far as I am concerned. I want to assure you that 

 you are not laboring- under any handicap by reason of not having 

 the indorsement of the Grain Corporation. 



Mr. Clement. Gentlemen, we concluded that when we called upon 

 a man and laid the facts before him and had his own documents to 

 convince him that he was wrong, if he could not see the justice of our 

 position we did not think his opposition was worth a continental. 

 That is why we felt that way about it. I have very little respect for 

 a man that has not any conception of justice, and we do not think he 

 has. 



Mr. Wilson. Is Mr. Barnes the only man that you saw in New 

 Tork? 



Mr. Clement. Yes, sir ; he was the only man we saw. 

 Mr. Young. I take it from your remarks that you gentlemen and 

 the producers are all thoroughly convinced that price-fixing is a 

 failure all along the line ? 



Mr. Clement. Well, I have a little flow of language that would 



express it — chiefly descriptive 



Mr. Wilson (interposing). Is it parliamentary? 

 Mr. Clement. Well, I never swear, but I would say you are 

 damned right. [Laughter,] 



Mr. Wilson. There are a number of gentlemen here from Illinois. 

 J wonder if any of them would like to be heard. 



