Ligonier Banner., Volume 78, Number 40, Ligonier, Noble County, 12 October 1944 — Page 7

| ' Washington DigestU

And Stifle Compefition ESSRN Big Monopolies Regulate Commerce Between Nations; Valuable Information Given By W Axis Under Business Pacts. e | By BAUKHAGE, - =~ . News Analyst and Commentator. %

WNU Service, Union Trust Building Washington, D. C.

When the political smoke of the campaign dies away we are all going to hear a lot more about cartels. Most people probably have a general idea of what they are but those of us who have followed the hearings of the Kilgore subcommittee on war mobilization learned a lot of things we didn’t know. :

I think I heard about cartels first from Bill Shepherd, a news‘paperman whom I was always meeting in different parts of the world. ‘He had just come back from Germany shortly after the last war and was full of the subject on which he had written an article for Colliers’. But we didn’t know the half of it then. ;

I mention that because it seems incredible that more was not done ,to break down the cartel system before. .

The simplest definition of a cartel is a monopoly and its most obvious effect is to gouge the consumer with monopolistic prices. A chemical plastic which can be sold to commercial moulders at 85 cents a pound, costs dentists $45.00 a pound. Same stuff. Atabrine, a synthetic substitute for quinine, sold to the government, presumably at a profit, at $4.50 for a thousand tablets, by a company with a cartel-controlled patent, under a contract that will end six months after the war. Atabrine costs you and me $12.00 per thousand tablets. Another feature of some cartels involved patent-leasing and this practice has resulted in most of the furor today because, by means of international cartels, both Germany and Japan got hold of secrets of value in the war.

For example, the American Bosch corporation provided its German affiliate with information developed by the signal corps of the army which the German army used as the basis for radio communication between tanks and ground and air forces. The Bosch company got the information in the form of specifications in army contracts on which it was bidding. Government Moves : To Smash System Naturally the government had to take action in cases like that. Recently the state department established an industries branch in the commodities division of the office of economic affairs and for some time the department of justice has been conducting investigations and in several cases has taken action. Cartels are one of the highly complicated matters which the peace negotiations will deal with. g

Assistant Attorney Gen. Wendell Berge, who has charge of investigations now going on, said: *“lt seems abundantly clear that America can never have a foreign policy based on the principles of democracy and international goodwill so long as international trade is dominated by cartels.” ; Berge believes theprinciple involved in the operation of the internal pools and monopolies is the greatest threat to full employment and therefore in many respects is one of the central issues of our time. This type of organization, he believes, restricts rather than promotes trade because it not' only drives out competition but also enters into agreements to limit production. That came out in the war and wherever there was a serious shortage, rubber, aluminum, magnesium, drugs, a ‘cartel was discovered in the woodpile. These combinations tend to become little governments of their own and their effect on foreign relations is clearly evidenced in the case of South America where the Germans obtained exclusive rights in many trade fields through these trade agreements and used these rights to build up their Nazi propaganda machine, Before the United States entered the war Germany was able to prevent firms in this country from supplying certain types of explosives to Britian because the American manufacturers had an agreement with the German affiliate not to do so. The same applied to optical goods. There are other examples which make your hair curl. e

BRIEFS. .. by Baukhage

There is a rumor of a tie-up between the Farmers’ union and the Clo, i : X - & & At the Quebec conference, Fala, who chased a cat Churchill adopted at the previous conference, turned over and went to sleep in the midst of the Prime Minister’s most dramatic ‘remarks at the final press conference.

- The Kilgore committee makes this statement, for instance, in its report: ¢ . ‘““The Japanese were able to get technical know-how on some processes for production of 100 per cent octane gasoline before they were generally available to American firms and in at least one case as late as June, 1941, to find out through commercial channels the amount of our oil and gasoline shipments to Pearl Harbor.” ; Some Agreements Sanctioned by U. S.

It must be said in frankness that in some cases American companies —specifically the one which had the right to certain manufacturing processes in high octane—had permission from the war department to extend their use in foreign countries. The Universal Oil Products company made special inquiry of the general staff regarding installing plants in Germany and Japan and they were told in July, 1938, ‘‘The war department has no objection for the exploitation of these processes abroad.” Other manufacturers were not so scrupulous. The Kilgore report reveals an .interesting letter written on April 17, 1940, three months after the President had announced a ‘““morale embargo’” against Japan. The letter was written by an official of a Texas oil company to a Mr. Darcy, representing the Mitsubishi Oil company of Japan. It was sent to Darcy’s home following up the conveying of ‘‘certain technical information’’ which Mr. Darcy sent to Tokyo. This is an excerpt from the letter:

‘“For your confidential information enclosed herewith please find photostatic copy of Saybolt’s analysis No. 1433 covering the supposedly 92 Octane gasoline for the Maritime Oil company. . . . You have conclusive proof that our oil will run up to 93. . . . The .attached report is sent you in complete confidence and be very careful to whom you disclose it, as it would get me into a terrific jam if it ever leaked out that I sent you this data.” . But the government of the United States seized the files of the Mitsubishi company and “it”’ has leaked all over the place and what is more “it”’ -is a comparatively harmless sample of other things' which will come out later on.

One of the interesting cartels deals in a product that few people not in the leather business know anything about. It is the quebracho, a substance used to tan and preserve leather and it comes from the bark of a tree grown chiefly in Argentina. .

The cartel is controlled by a company owned and managed by the British. It has an exceedingly tight monopoly and to an extent can therefore control leather prices. Since it has been in operation quebracho prices have shot up and production has gone down. The figures disclosed by the investigation show that before the cartel was formed quebracho was selling at just about one-half what it costs today. Six price-boosts were made in seven years and the firm is said to be tiow making 33% per cent profit. All but 10 per cent of the quebracho production is controlled by the cartel and’' many methods are used to hamstring the independents; the chief of which is to make secret arrangements with shippers not to allow cargo space to the competitors, and the cooperation which the cartel enjoys in high places is revealed in the course of indictment proceedings by the department of justice. The two firms involved were represented by no less than an official envoy of the Argentine government. ¢

The quebracho pool sent vital supplies to Japan up to the last few years and did it at cut-rates absorbing the loss by boosting the price to this country. It has recently been predicted that if this pool continues in operation there will be a serious leather shortage after the war. But substitutes are no solution of the cartel problem. A world in which one man has to use ersatz-sauce for his goose while another gets the gravy for his gander, iisn’t exactly according to the American idea of fair play. : ;

The Germans tried to boost morale of troops in Normandy by broadcasting the sound of approaching tanks. Hundrede¢ of soldiers, believing tanks were supporting them, advanced and were 'f}kiiled. , : * g 3 _ Nearly four hundred million tire-, ‘miles are saved yearly under a program being carried out by the dairy i' mtryo i ! VT

THE LIGONIER BANNER, LIGONIER, IND.

Sees Forest Conservation Need: ‘ Vast Areas of Spent Timberland Attest to Careless Practices

By LYLE F. WATTS (Chief U. S. Forest Service) Recently, in an address before a section of the Society of American Foresters at Milwaukee, Wis., I discussed the nation’s forest situation and presented the need for reasonable public control of the treatment of private forest lands. In commenting on that paper, a friend of mine alleged that, “In normal periods the basic American forestry problem is not one of scarcities but of surpluses, not of timber famine but of timber abundance.” I want to explore that philosophy because, if it is true, there is really no occasion for much concern about forest conservation. In discussing this question of scarcity versus abundance, I j;vant to

make it clear that forestry is some-. thing more than boards, ties, cordwood and other forest products. To me forestry has a human side. It encompasses permanent communities with prosperous industries and a stable tax base. It means good schools, public health and attractive homes. It means security for the worker to invest in a home, and for the butcher, the baker, anci beauty shop keeper to invest in a business. Seventy per cent of New England is forest land, but 75 per cent of all the wood products consumed in New England comes from outside the region. The only evidence of surplus, so far as I know,, is in small lowgrade material which cannot be marketed even under the intense demand of the huge industrial population.

The hurricane of 1938, followed by abnormal wartime requirements for box boards, has left only scattered remnants of merchantable white pine in central New England. Scarcity of stumpage forced several of the leading operators in Massachusetts to move out of that state recently. Even in the wild lands of Maine, most of which have been gone over several times by logging operations since colonial times, the average cut of pulpwood, taking all that is considered merchantable from the ground, is estimated at only four cords per acre. Such an average certainly implies no troublesome surplus of available timber. ;

Not so many generations ago Pennsylvania was the leading source of the nation’s lumber supply. In 1941 it ranked 23rd among the states with an output of less than 1 per. cent of the total. The original pine forests have been’ largely replaced by scrub oak and other hardwoods as a result of fire following logging. The forest survey for Virginia showed sawtimber growth in 1940 some 25 per cent in excess of drain by cutting. So perhaps we should find a timber surplus here. But of what significance is an excess of growth over drain when lumber output is only about half of what it was 30 years earlier? The decline in Virginia's lumber output is a reflection of sawtimber scarcity. Stands with as much as 8,000 board feet per acre occupy less than 4 per cent of the total forest area. More wood was consumed by non-lumber use than for lumber in 1940.

The coastal plain and Piedmont regions of the Deep South contain over 150 million acres of land wonderfully adapted to tree growth but not well suited. for other purposes. All but a small fraction of the old-growth timber has been cut so that any surplus must be in second growth,

Almost three-fourths of this great acreage is in thrifty second growth, yet the growing stock is rated at less than half of what it should be. Some #0 million acres, mostly in the longleaf pine belt of the coastal plain, lie denuded. Only one-fourth of the total cubic volume of pine is sawlog material and almost threefourths of that is in trees less than 16 inches in diameter. In spite of the ease of reproduction and the exceptionally rapid growth of the more valuable pines, hardwoods now account for almost 60 per cent of the cubic volume of all trees.

The timber supply is vital to the great agricuyltural states of the Middle West. The situation became so acute -in 1942 that two large farm cooperatives bought sawmills in distant forest regions in order to be sure of having the lumber they needed.

Had the forests of this region been given proper care from the beginning, farmers might still- be able to meet many of their needs from local timber. Most of the older barns in southern Ohio and Indiana, for

SAVE GOOD TIMBER IN WOODLOT BY BURNING POORER STANDS

Wood from poorly formed trees burns just as well as wood ' from future saw-log trees. Wood from such weed trees as irgnwood, shadbush, and even beech, has a high ‘heating value. The temptation is to strip the woodlot when firewood is cut, thereby destroying local and national re--sources for the future. ‘“The Winter .Fuel and A Better Woodlot,” is one | slogan that has been used by many ‘woodland owners in this state.

example, were built of yellow poplar. Yellow poplar grows almost as fast as any of our softwoods and is just as easily worked. But today it is far too precious to put into barns. It is no longer a significant part of the stock of the local lumber yards. - All the big pine operations are now gone from the Missouri Ozarks. Output of softwood lumber in Missouri in 1942 was only 30 million board feet. Yet in 1899 most of the threefourths billion board feet of lumber cut in that state was softwood.

Throughout the hill country from eastern Ohio to western Missouri, millions of acres of once magnificent hardwood forests have degenerated into mere brush cover. Many of the

L N e W e ONER ST PR £,? 55 e & SRS ?\, B ,_‘:-:(o‘&"“ ‘/;-‘- Ly ; i PR R k 2 3 3 b 2 SSR S PR § 3 : "‘. R %%5\9& e e - s | R s > B e B : ¥ p o AN L s 23 gwfi,,w,‘?\”\,% S s , T s T %Qif;fi” i%\fi = . g G ”%%m s e e e e K.oal Even in New England, where this huge red oak towering 130 feet up and measuring almost 20 feet in circumference was cut, there is no real timber surplus.

hardwood industries of the Ohio and Mississippi valleys' must now pay heavy transportation charges for raw material from other regions in order to continue operation. Some of them face extinction. The lake states affords one of the most serious chapters of our forest history. Here are some 52 million: acres of generally level forest land, favorably lecated with reference to important industrial and agricultural sections. Extensive clear cutting and uncontrolled forest fire have made a large part of this area an economic liability. The white pine and red pine which

National War Fund Drive: . | Almost Half of Money to Go Toward Cheering U. S. Fighters

" A “home front’* army four million strong went into action October 1 in every city and county of the United States to back up the fighting fronts in providing essential wartime services f¢r our own and our Allies. In a single united appeal in some 10,000 communities throughout the United States, this army“of volunteer workers, enlisted under the aegis of the national war fund and united war chests, is seeking contributions for the support of local welfare services and to provide for the needs of the men and women of our own armed forces, American prisoners of war, the men of our merchant marine and civilian war victims among the United Nations. The combined objective of the volunteers in this army is contributions in excess of $250,000,000. Beneficiaries of this vast fund will be an estimated 60,000,000 people who, in some way, will be touched by the services of the federated war chests and the 22 member agencies of the national war fund.

When the operations of this vast army have been concluded, it is believed that approximately 35,000,000 individuals: and family groups will have contributed to the vital work of the various organizations, both at home and in some 91 major geographical areas on six continents. - Out of every dollar contributed for the national war fund agencies, 46% cents will be spent to provide com-: fort, entertainment and relaxation for our own armed forces. __The expenditure of this proportion of contributions will finance the activities of the following organizations: USO, which brings a touch of home to our fighting forces in some 3,000 units from Alaska to Brazil and from Newfoundland to Hawaii; USO camp shows, which carry professional _entertainment around the globe to our servicemen and women in combat zones, in base stations and hospitals; United Seaman’s “service, which maintains a chain “of hotels on six continents and rest centers in this country for the men of our merchant ma-

Usually, the cut in the woodlot should be no more than 30 per cent in any one year, and the sooner dnother cut can be made from the same woodland. Cutters should keep in mind that a well-formed hardwood tree 10 inches on the stump is probably 50 years old, but would yield only a six-inch log. containing four ‘board feef, Doyle scale, or 0.09 | standard cord of wood. In eight years more this tree would be 12 | inches; would contain 16 board feet

contributed so bountifully to the development of the Middle West are now little more than memories. Although some old growth—chiefly hardwood — still remains, the most significant aspect is the large proportion of inferior species, notably jack pine and aspen, in the second Having looked in vain for timber surpluses in other important forest regions, we turn at last to the West coast. The timber of Idaho and Montana was almost untouched up to 1900. But the wave of depletion is rolling through this country with startling speed. In Idaho the five northern counties were opened up first and were soon pretty thoroughly exploited. Output reached a peak of 705 million board feet in 1925. In 1937 it was only 292 million. Obviously payrolls -in these northern counties declined in about the same ration as Jumber production. Towns like Sandpoint and Coeur d’Alene were hard hit — and Spokane turned its eyes from the panhandle of Idaho to the Grand Coulee dam. The increased output now coming from the five counties farther south rests on a precarious base. Only onetenth of the 10 million acres of forest in North Idaho is‘in white pine sawtimber—yet this tenth is bearing the brunt of current cut. White pine output is now 2% times what the forests can sustain.

But even within this region, the apparent surplus is local in character. The only area still largely undeveloped is a portion of southern Oregon. In the older districts, notably. around Puget Sound, the bulk of the readily accessible sawtimber has been removed. Sawmills have shut down and pulp mills have assumed greater importance. The available stand is no longer as large as the growing stock needed to sustain a cut commensurate with the growth capacity of the land.

The lower Columbia river district with 170 large mills and 40 billion feet of sawtimber is already feeling the pinch of scarcity. About half of the private sawtimber belongs to tWwo large companies. Most of the other mills face difficulty in getting the timber they need for long-time operation. I want to close by stating my conviction that a comprehensive legislative charter is needed to give effect to a well-rounded national forest policy and to strengthen the foundation for timely postwar action in the forestry field. !

rine who see that the vital cargoes of munitions and materials of war get through to the fighting fronts; War Prisoners aid, which provides recreational, educational and cultural materials for prisoners of war to afford an antidote for the boredom so aptly termed ‘‘barbed wire disease.” = =

Approximately 32 cents out of every national war fund dollar will be spent to provide emergency relief for civilian victims of war in the nations of our Allies, overrun and occupied by the-Nazi invaders. Assistance for the peoples of the Axis - dominated nations includes: food and clothing for Chinese war orphans; medical kits and medicing for the Yugoslavs; subsistence rations for millions of starving Greeks; seeds to replant- the scorched earth of Russia; dried milk for undernourished = Norwegian school children; food packages for Belgian refugees; seed packets for British Victory gardens to ease the critical food shortage; aid for millions of Polish refugees seattered throughout the world; care in this country for child evacuees from Europe; food and clothing for needy people of France; and aid of various kinds for war victims of Czechoslovakia, Luxembourg, Denmark, Holland and Italy.: ' :

The remainder of the war fund dollar, including two-thirds for administration, will be held in a contingent fund for emergency needs and unforeseen developments resulting from the liberation of occupied nafions. : v

The “home-front’”’ army will take to its task with the following message of inspiration from Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, supreme commander of the Allied expeditionary force: “All Americans know it is a privilege to contribute to the national and community war funds in this year of liberation. Complementing our military campaigns, the services which flow from these funds reach out to friends and neighbors at home and abroad and to the oppressed peoples of the world. : ik (Signed) Dwight D. Eisenhower.” :

(four times as much lumber), or 0.17 cord of wood. If left fifteen years this tree would be 14 inches on the stump, would contain 36 board feet in the first log and 8 in the second log, or one-quarter cord of wood. . Green wood will burn, but sea‘soned wood is preferred, as it .is lighter to handle, has more heat ‘value, and forms less creosote in the chimney. Most of the seasoning takes place during the first six months after the tree is cut.: °

Colorful Ru%?[Made " Of Scrap Materials i \ _ N ! 54 Pd | : .-~ : \\ L \,l\ S DRI RN, AR e AN SR A R A S NG S B R SR\ g A ‘u:\‘"‘f«"‘v :'.“\'. - DN N g ST R~ N 9],"-,“”_: g . N "r\\% o S ~::*&??-;:).-:l:?%7‘ L™ % ",-",,' vr\ ./Y‘f-‘.'.‘— 'w(’.":;v ’ ‘;‘;\»‘:7?;';«:“‘ -. s X 4 L N & 5 N o IR Y e et gTI iy \‘fi w, N 6\3‘ AR K NER v Lo 2 g GET out the rag bag and get to work. Weéave, crochet, hook or braid these colorful rugs out of old scraps of material. : *® i & Need new rugs? Start today and make them yourself! Instructions 7222 has directions for nine rugs; list of materials; pattern pieces.

Sewing Circle Needlecraft Dept. 564 W. Randolph St. Chicago 80, Il Enclose 15 cents (plus one cent to cover cost of mailing) fof Pattern o - NamL—_— AOOTRSR. .oo oo

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