Mr. OLSEN. Quite right.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, you are not going to get a date for all of these censuses that will suit each separate crop.

Mr. THURSTON. We have to appreciate the fact that we are trying to take a census of agriculture of a country that is 4,000 miles across one way and 2,500 the other.

The CHAIRMAN. Surely.

Mr. THURSTON. And, it is manifest that different times of the year would be better for some particular business.

The CHAIRMAN. Well, let us take fruits.

Mr. THURSTON. And, we are trying to approach a happy medium. The CHAIRMAN. We will get it in time.

Mr. THURSTON. These inquiries are not evidences of hostility to what you have to say at all.

Mr. OLSEN. I appreciate that fully.

The CHAIRMAN. Not in the slightest.

Mr. OLSEN. You understand, gentlemen, that I am trying to develop the situation as we see it in our department.

The CHAIRMAN. Your testimony has been very valuable to us and will help us, I have no doubt, in arriving at a suitable time, or date, or whatever you may call it, for the taking of these censuses of distribution and agriculture.

Mr. OLSEN. May I answer a question that you raised with regard to fruits. It is true that a good many fruits are harvested at various times of the year. Those tables that I have submitted do not, of course, show all of the data. But, with regard to the fruits the department is getting the carload movement. When we get that data we go through and check up the production figures.

The CHAIRMAN. Strawberries, for instance, are going out of Louisiana in carloads at the present moment.

There is a great movement of citrus fruit in September, October, November, and December from Florida; then the great apple crop from the northwest, New England and Michigan, that is being shipped in the fall.

I only cite this one difficulty of arriving at a date that would be absolutely best for each one of the different crops of the country, but we will try to get an acceptable date.

Mr. LozIER. There is no date that will be appropriate to all fruits. In California the naval orange crop begins to move not earlier than December, and the Valencia oranges begin to move in the latter part of June and July. The Florida oranges are moving now.

Mr. OLSEN. Yes; the Florida oranges are moving now.

The CHAIRMAN. Then you have grapes and apples, prunes, peaches; look at the peaches. They begin to move in January from Florida and run right on up to September and October in New England and perhaps some of the other States.

Mr. OLSEN. We recognize that situation and we have the car-lot data to fall back upon. We are more concerned, as I said, about acreage figur think that the car-lot movement data that is given to the dep mobably give us more accurate information I receive from the census.

o for just a moment. In connection tries, I saw the statement the other day All of the States in the shipment of straw

in that data, from your department?

Mr. OLSEN. I presume so.

The CHAIRMAN. I read that with a good deal of interest and I might suggest that our strawberries do not begin to ripen until the middle of June.

I want you to keep in mind that what we have said here is not in criticism of what you have said. We are simply trying along a different way to get what we want.

Mr. OLSEN. I understand, Mr. Chairman. In connection with the livestock question, I want to say that we have done our best to harmonize and readjust our figures from the census of 1900 on, to the January 1 figure, and we had an awful time getting an adjustment with April 15, 1910, because we do not know what these figures actually picture. It is important to have the census data in such shape that we can make comparisons and determine whether we are progressing or declining.

Then, the farm slaughter is going to be affected. When you ask for the farm slaughter you are going to have the data for two years. That is going to be confusing and is not going to be adequate. Mr. MOORMAN. Slaughter, you say?

Mr. OLSEN. Yes, farm slaughter; animals slaughtered on the farm. Mr. MOORMAN. Where do you get that information there, as shown on that chart?

Mr. OLSEN. From the Crop Reporter.

Mr. MOORMAN. In connection with the slaughter on the farms, if you had an earlier census you could not hope to get the true figures as to the slaughter conditions? You know that there would not be very much slaughtering on the farm before November 30, and I think that you could get much more information about stock slaughtered on the farm on April 1. I should think that the farmers would know what had been slaughtered on the farm then. There is not very much slaughtering before the 1st of January.

Mr. OLSEN. No. I think that you are going to get, for the year 1929, more accurate information as to slaughter figures if you take that census on December 1, or January 1, than if you postpone it until April 1.

Mr. MOORMAN. There is not much slaughtering on the farm before January 1?

Mr. OLSEN. There is a good deal of slaughtering before December 1. Mr. MOORMAN. What section of the country are you referring to? Mr. OLSEN. I am referring now especially to the Central West, with which I am familiar.

Mr. LOZIER. You say that there is considerable slaughtering on the farm before December 1?

Mr. OLSEN. Yes, sir; there is considerable slaughtering on the farm before December 1.

Mr. LozIER. I do not think that there are many animals slaughtered on the farm before December 1. You must have reference to the slaughter that is taken care of by the packers and sent into cold storage, if you refer to the Middle West.

Mr. THURSTON. The farmer could not do very much slaughtering until the weather gets cold and he could not do very much of that before December 1.

Mr. OLSEN. Well, I am referring to conditions in the State of Illinois where I grew up.

I will ask Mr. Harlan, who is familiar with the livestock and marketing conditions, to explain.

Mr. HARLAN. I think that probably 30 per cent of the farmers who slaughter hogs in eastern United States, on the farms, for sale, slaughter between the 1st of November and the 1st of March. Conditions are different in the South.

Mr. MOORMAN. April 1 would get that. Will you tell us the percentage of slaughter that takes place on the farms prior to December 1, the time the Department of Agriculture is fixing as the proper date for the taking of this census; that is what we are interested in. Mr. HARLAN. I should say that probably two-thirds of the slaughter takes place in November and December.

Mr. MOORMAN. Two-thirds?

Mr. HARLAN. Yes.

Mr. MOORMAN. Have you any figures that you can file as a part of your evidence substantiating that statement?

Mr. HARLAN. Yes; we have a record showing the reports from a large number of farmers.

Mr. MOORMAN. Will you please file that; give us the benefit of those figures?

Mr. HARLAN. Yes, sir.

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Mr. OLSEN. This table shows the slaughter on the farm. That [indicating] would show it between January 1 and April 1.

Mr. LOZIER. Do you not think that the farmers will know whether they have slaughtered their meat before January 1, or after January 1? Is that your conception of the intelligence or the memory of the farmer, that he can not tell April 1 whether he killed his hogs before January 1 or not?

Mr. OLSEN. Well, I am just giving you the returns that have been made by a large number of farmers throughout the country.

Mr. MOORMAN. Then, I think that we had better get a different bunch of farmers to make the returns. That is not true in my country at all.

The CHAIRMAN. Well, gentlemen, the hour has arrived for adjournment, unless the committee would like to continue its session. Mr. DE ROUEN. How can you show the strawberries that are shipped from November 1, for instance, from Louisiana?

Mr. OLSEN. Can you answer that question, Mr. Becker?

Mr. BECKER. Why, of course, would all depend on what the census consisted of. If you asked for the were 1929, that, of course, would refer resumably Louisiana farmers harvested.

wberries for re that the

Mr. DE ROUEN. 1928; you would not get 1929. They are put out in the fall and they have not finished harvest until the following March, so you would have to go two years back to get any data as to the number of cars in the movement of Louisiana strawberries.

Mr. BECKER. In a November 1 inquiry the department would be asking for the acreage that he had the first of that year, which would be about 11 months ago.

Mr. OLSEN. That is right.

Mr. BECKER. Now, in April he would be asked for his acreage; it would cover about a 15-month period.

Mr. DE ROUEN. That is acreage or production?

Mr. BECKER. All that the department, as I understand, would ask for would be the acreage. I do not understand that they are asking for the production. I do not believe in the last census that question was asked.

The CHAIRMAN. We are considering production in the committee for this census.

Mr. BECKER. Then, he would be asked on the 1st of November for the production of strawberries which came off the farm for from about 11 months to 9 months preceding the time when the census was taken. If you asked that same question in April and still wished the production for the year 1929, that period would be about 12 or 13 months on which he would be asked to report.

Mr. DE ROUEN. One year; we are trying to arrive at the figures for one year.

Mr. LOZIER. In other words, one crop?

Mr. MOORMAN. That would not show a picture of any 12 months or a single 12-month period.

Mr. Becker, will you explain the difficulties that would arise with reference to barley, wheat, rye, and other fall-planted crops?

Mr. BECKER. Well, as explained a short time ago, approximately two-thirds of the total wheat acreage of the country is sown in the fall and by the 1st of April if farmers are asked to report on wheat acreage, unless it is very specifically called to their attention that this is intended to cover the preceding year, some of the farmers would report the number of acres that they have sown and some of them would report on the number of acres that they have harvested. So they will be somewhat confused and there will be some confusion as to the acreage in figuring on the wheat.

On the 1st of April a good many farmers in Texas, for example, are getting ready to harvest their next crop of wheat. That is true, of course, to a lesser extent in other States, and especially in the Southern States.

Mr. WHITE. I would like to ask the gentleman this question: Would not the farmer understand that this was information for the preceding year, when he was giving that acreage?

Mr. BECKER. He would not understand it in all cases.

The CHAIRMAN. That is the call of the House. The committee will stand adjourned until to-morrow morning at half past 10. If you gentlemen will come to-morrow morning we will be glad to hear you further.

(Thereupon, the committee adjourned until 10.30 o'clock a. m. of the following morning.)

85244-28-16

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,
COMMITTEE ON THE CENSUS,
Thursday, February 9, 1928.

The committee met at 10.30 o'clock a. m., Hon. E. Hart Fenn (chairman) presiding.

The CHAIRMAN. Gentlemen, before Mr. Olsen continues his statement of yesterday, there is a gentleman present representing certain allied grocers' organization who desires to be heard briefly in support of Secretary Hoover's recommendation, and if there is no objection we will hear him at this time. Will you give your name and whom you represent, for the record?

STATEMENT OF CHARLES WESLEY DUNN, NEW YORK CITY, REPRESENTING THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF RETAIL GROCERS, THE AMERICAN GROCERS' SPECIALTY MANUFACTURERS' ASSOCIATION, AND THE AMERICAN PHARMACEUTICAL MANUFACTURERS' ASSOCIATION

Mr. DUNN. My name is Charles Wesley Dunn, of New York City. I am general counsel for the National Association of Retail Grocers, which represents the retail gorcers of the United States, whose number exceeds 300,000 in the aggregate. I am also counsel for the American Grocers' Specialty Manufacturers' Association, which includes about 200 of the leading food and grocery products manufacturers of the country. I am also counsel for the American Pharmaceutical Manufacturers' Association, which includes most of the pharmaceutical manufacturers of the country who sell to the medical profession and the drug trade. I am here to indorse the recommendation of Secretary Hoover that there be a census of distribution made by the Government. The distribution of grocery products and, to a lesser extent, of drug products, is undergoing a fundamental evolution at the present time, and the whole matter is so vast that it is necessary really to have a Government census of all the factors and processes of distribution, in order that the manufacturers and merchants may intelligently know what the facts are and be governed in the conduct of their business accordingly. That is all I have to say. We think it would be a great public service, and it is almost a necessary thing to do, for the intelligent conduct of business to-day.

The CHAIRMAN. In your remarks you said that these trades were undergoing a fundamental evolution. What do you mean by that? Mr. DUNN. I mean by that, that the chain store has come into the distribution of grocery products in this country, and now does about 30 per cent, so far as we can find out, of the total business, which means the consequent elimination of the wholesale grocer to a certain extent, and of the individual retail grocer to a certain extent; and all of these changes, and factors in the changes, it is necessary for business to know. It is very hard, especially for the smaller merchants, who have no facilities for getting this information, to know the facts.

The CHAIRMAN. Do the so-called chain stores belong to your association?

Mr. DUNN. No, sir; I represent the individual retail grocers.
The CHAIRMAN. The chain stores do not belong?

Mr. DUNN. No, sir.