Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 289, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 December 1920 — TO SEIZE STOCKYARDS [ARTICLE]

TO SEIZE STOCKYARDS

U. S. Asks for Trustee to Take Possession. Government Petitions District Supreme Court to Sell Property of Five Big Packers at Chicago. Washington, Dec. 2. —The government petitioned the district supreme court to appoint a trustee to take possession of and sell- the stockyards property of the big five packers. By Its petition the government has taken an affirmative stand on the question of disposing of the Chicago packers’ stockyard interests, according to counsel for the department of justice. It was explained that heretofore the government had merely objected to plans offered by the packers without suggesting a method pf divorcing the properties as required under the consent decree in the packer cases. Formal protest is made against the joint proposal of the Armour and Sw'ift companies in modification of the original project of all the packers for a holding company for the stockyards properties to be organized by F. H. Prince & Co. of Boston. The government also objected to the separate plan presented by the Morris company, but obtained a week’s extension to file its views as to the Cudahy company’s plan, the last to be presented to the court. Opposition to the Prince holding company scheme was based on the contention that it would prevent operation of the properties under separate interests, such as stock raisers and feeders- /.

To the Morris plan, which provides that the.concern assign all its stock to a trust company named by the court, the government objected on the ground that it was not in accord with the' decree requirement that the packers, divest themselves of their stockyard properties. The government also argued that Morris 4 Co. would retain the right to fix the price of securities to be issued by the trust company, | no.t permitting the court to determine, a fair price. The government also as- ’ serted that not sufficient assurance j was given that the Morris company’s, relation to the stockyard properties would be entirely broken off through the removal of officers and employees. <