126 ESSAYS ON "WHEAT 



tinent and the action of the grain exchanges compelled the 

 governments of the United States and Canada to consider 

 what they could do under the circumstances. In the 

 United States, a food controller, Mr. Herbert Hoover, was 

 appointed and the Food Control Bill tabled, with the result 

 that there was created the United States Grain Corporation 

 which was put in charge of the most gigantic wheat mo- 

 nopoly the world has ever seen. 



The United States Grain Corporation became the only 

 buyer of wheat at the great terminal markets and the only 

 seller and distributor of wheat from these markets to the 

 American mills, the European allies, and the neutral coun- 

 tries. In the United States the exporters were first thrown 

 out of business. Then it was decided to create the Grain 

 Corporation. Then, by a Commission appointed by the 

 President, prices were fixed at which the Corporation was 

 to buy all the wheat. Then future trading was prohibited. 

 And, finally, the mixing of the grades of grain at the great 

 terminal markets was made impossible. If there is added 

 to this the fact — although this was not due to the war — 

 that the United States Government had taken over the 

 matter of the inspection of grain, had standardized the 

 grade, and had taken the inspection out of the hands of the 

 different state legislatures, boards of trade and grain ex- 

 changes, it is not difficult to realize that the war has abso- 

 lutely revolutionized the whole grain business of the United 

 States. In the spring of 1914, no one could have imagined 

 that, as the result of a European war, the United States 

 Government would purchase all the wheat in the United 

 States ; that a government body would fix the prices ; that 

 the government would prohibit future trading; and that 

 the government would prevent mixing of the grades, which 

 was the very foundation of the great sample markets of the 

 United States. Yet this is what actually happened.®* 

 «*J. C. Gage, loo. cit., pp. 42-43. 



