STATEMENT OF MR. WALTER Y. DURAND, ASSISTANT CHIEF OF COMMERCE, FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION. The CHAIRMAN. Please state your name. Mr. DURAND. Walter Y. Durand, Assistant Chief of Commerce, Federal Trade Commission. Mr. Chairman, the commission received from you this letter, dated May 5, inviting it to send a representative here to this hearing, and if I may, I will read this letter so that it may be in the record. Hon. HUSTON THOMPSON, Chairman Federal Trade Commission, Washington, D. C. MAY 5, 1921. MY DEAR MR. THOMPSON: I have been instructed by the committee to invite you to send a representative to appear before the committee to-morrow afternoon, Friday, May 6, in connection with the meat packer hearings now being held and which close to-morrow. The resolution extending the invitation requests information as to whether you commission's report on the packer investigation was sent through the State Department or otherwise to the foreign governments, and if so, a copy of the letter of transmittal, and the reason for so doing. Very truly, yours, G. N. HAUGEN, Chairman. I have been asked by the commissioners to appear here as representing them in responding to this request of the committee. Answering as to whether the commission's meat-packing report was sent through the State Department or otherwise to the foreign governments, that question has already been answered specifically by the commission in a special report made to the Senate on July 31, 1919, in response to Senator Sherman's resolution. This report, in response to that resolution, was printed in the Congressional Record of July 31, 1919, pages 3410 to 3419, and with your permission I will explain briefly, particularly for the benefit of any new members of the committee, what the Sherman resolution was, and this will explain also why the commission is unable to send you a response to that part of your request asking that it furnish a copy of any letter transmitting the meat-packing report to foreign governments. Senator Sherman's resolution, which was referred to the Senate. Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, was as follows: RESOLUTION. JULY 10, 1919. Resolved, That the Federal Trade Commission be, and is hereby, requested to furnish to the Senate, at the earliest possible moment, copies of all documents, correspondence, or other papers in its possession relating to its efforts or action in promotion or concerning the export trade in meats from the United States to the United Kingdom of Great Britain or any of its colonial dependencies, and other countries, and especially any communications by the Federal Trade Commission, or any of its members, officers, agents, or employees with the officers or agents of any foreign government, and more especially all communications had with the Ministry of Reconstruction of Great Britain or the members thereof appointed in 1918, and to include all correspondence with the Hon. Charles A. McCurdy, Member of Parliament, of the Ministry of Foods, and recently chairman of the committee on trusts; also such correspondence with any other member of the Ministry of Reconstruction in relation to the meat industries of the United States. That resolution was adopted, following charges on the floor of the Senate that the commission, and particularly Commissioner Colver, had deliberately attempted to injure the export or foreign trade of the packers; that Commissioner Colver had gone to England at public expense; that he had made speeches and given out interviews attacking the packers. Extracts from an alleged interview with Commissioner Colver as printed in the London Star, were read into the record. When the Sherman resolution was answered in detail by the commission's report to the Senate, and the voluminous documents called for by the resolution were transmitted to the Senate, among the documents was this letter which your committee requests us to furnish. It is listed in the report like this; that is, in the commission's report to the Senate in answer to the Sherman resolution: You will find it on page 3414 of the Congressional Record for July 31, 1919: Mr. KINCHELOE. How long is that letter? Mr. DURAND. This is a short paragraph listing the letter. Mr. DURAND. I have not got the letter. Mr. KINCHELOE. Do you mean the letter written by the Secretary of State to the foreign countries Mr. DURAND. Yes; I do not have it. I was explaining why I could not give it to the committee. I will give you a copy of it that appears in the Congressional Record. I was just explaining that the resolution calling for that report called for a lot of data, and this was listed in the commission's report as follows, reading from page 3414: File 8754-4303: Letter September 27, 1918, from Federal Trade Commission to Chief Diplomatic Bureau, State Department, Washington, requesting that copies of meat-packing report be sent through the proper channels to the foreign Governments named. (Inclosure to foregoing letter, being copy of suggested letter transmitting said report to the heads of the respective Governments.) Mr. KINCHELOE. You say that letter is in the Congressional Record somewhere? Mr. DURAND. That letter we can not furnish you, because the resolution, while as adopted by the Senate it called for copies of all those documents, the commission found that such a mass of material was included under the terms of the resolution that it directed its secretary to communicate with the Secretary of the Senate as to the proper method of procedure, because the resolution indicated that it desired the documents to be furnished with the utmost dispatch, and the commission was advised by the Secretary of the Senate that the commission should furnish to the Senate the originals of all those documents, and that the Senate would then copy such of the documents as it desired to keep for its files and would thereafter return all of the originals to the commission. Now, none of those originals have been returned. Mr. KINCHELOE. And it includes this original letter? Mr. DURAND. These documents include the letter that you refer to. As I understand, the letter is now in the files of the Senate committee. Mr. CLARKE. Along with the letter went the summary of the report? Mr. DURAND. I will read you what is in the letter. I might say that the commission happens to have copies or photostat copies of a great many of those documents that went to the Senate, but did not happen to have any copies of this particular letter that went to the Senate. However, I have a printed quotation of the letter, which, as I say, was read into the Congressional Record by Senator Sherman on January 21, 1921. Mr. KINCHELOE. Haven't you that here? Mr. DURAND. I have here a copy of the letter as read by Senator Sherman, as he quoted it. Mr. CLARKE. Is that the entire letter? Mr. DURAND. It purports to be the entire letter, a correct copy. I could not certify to that. Senator Sherman says, on January 21, 1921, on page 1748 of the Congressional Record, speaking of this letter; it is addressed to the Chief of the Diplomatic Bureau of the State Department, Washington, D. C., and is as follows: It is requested that one copy of the Federal Trade Commission's summary to the report of the meat-packing industry be sent through the proper channels to the head of each of the countries listed below: Great Britain, France, Brazil, Paraguay, Panama, Guatemala, Italy, Spain, Chile, Mexico, Cuba, Switzerland, Argentina, Venezuela, Uruguay, Haiti, Sweden, Norway, Colombia, Portugal, and Honduras. There is inclosed a form letter, containing ideas the commission desires to convey to the recipients of this report, which material is to be used as your judgment may direct. The commission appreciates your courtesy in taking care of this matter. Very truly, yours, And then Senator Sherman adds FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION. Mr. TEN EYCK. What was the date of that letter? Mr. DURAND. September 27, 1918, and I have read the letter as Senator Sherman quotes it. Then Senator Sherman adds: Here is the form letter referred to which I have been able to procure, filled out and addressed to the President of Switzerland. It is dated September 26, 1918, and reads: Mr. THOMPSON. Who was that addressed to? Mr. DURAND. The foreign governments. Mr. KINCHELOE. That is, by the State Department? Mr. DURAND. This was following a form letter to the State Department. The commission does not know whether any letter was sent out by the State Department or not. Mr. CLARKE. It is in the record last night that it got into the hands of the Department of Agriculture of Greece. Mr. THOMPSON. That was testified to yesterday. Mr. KINCHELOE. That letter seemed to be complying with a request. Mr. LIGHTFOOT. It is a summary of a report, and a copy of this summary of report was found in the Department of Agriculture of Greece a short time after the date of this letter. It was assumed it reached there through the channels, having been sent there a short time after the date of this letter.. Mr. THOMPSON. Is there any evidence to show that that letter was transmitted by the State Department; are you going to lead up to this? Mr. DURAND. There isn't any here. Mr. THOMPSON. Have you any knowledge? Mr. DURAND. No, sir. The CHAIRMAN. Would you prefer to conclude your reading? Mr. DURAND. Yes; I will read the form letter inclosed with the letter to the State Department. The CHAIRMAN. Very well; then we will have the whole matter before us. Mr. DURAND. This is the form letter which was inclosed in the letter to the Chief of the Diplomatic Bureau of the State Department, as it is given by Senator Sherman. It is dated September 26, 1918, and reads: The PRESIDENT, Switzerland. MEAT-PACKING REPORT. SIR: There is inclosed herewith a copy of the summary of the report of the Federal Trade Commission on the meat industry, which was recently released for publication by President Wilson, and which may be of interest to your Government. Two copies have also been sent direct to the legation of your country in Washington. By direction of the commission and with expressions of its highest esteem. Yours, very truly, FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION... Mr. KINCHELOE. Is the letter contained in the summary of the Federal Trade Commission the thing you were objecting to last night? Mr. LIGHTFOOT. I did not get your question. Mr. KINCHELOE. There is nothing in the letter there. The summary of the Federal Trade Commission, is that the one you talked about which prejudiced your foreign trade? Mr. LIGHTFOOT. Yes; I want to call your attention to the fact that the summary of the Federal Trade Commission, before these volumes were out, six or seven volumes, published a summary of what was to appear more at length in these other volumes. This summary was issued in June. Mr. DURAND. July 3, 1918, was the date, but it was not released for publication until about August 8, I think. It was August 8. Mr. LIGHTFOOT. At that time all of these six or seven large volumes had not been published, but the published summary contained 40 or 50 or more pages; I do not remember how many. In this summary they gave an outline of what was to appear when these other volumes and the letter of transmission to the President, as well as this summary charged that the five packers had created a monopoly. Mr. KINCHELOE. What I am getting at is if it was the summary rather than the letter from the State Department that militated against you? Mr. LIGHTFOOT. No; you misunderstood me. I said this summary of the Federal Trade Commission contained what we considered damaging statements in relation to these packers, and contained gratuitous statements with reference to our foreign trade, and they stated that the monopoly was going to involve, unless controlled in this country-involve this country in international complications of some kind. And all those damaging statements, the Federal Trade Commission appear to have prepared voluntarily, because there is nothing in the correspondence to show, or in letters that they list, any request from the President of Switzerland, or the Queen of Holland, or the presidents of the South American republics, for this summary. And you will notice this document is headed, or dated, the 26th of September, a little more than a month after the time it was released for publication. Now, our contention was that all of these circumstances showed that the Federal Trade Commission had voluntarily sent the summary of their report to the heads of these different governments. In order that it might go through proper channels to the heads of the governments named, they addressed a letter to the Secretary of State, that letter which Mr. Durand just read, requesting the Secretary of State to transmit the summaries to these different heads of the different governments, and inclosing a form letter to be used by the Secretary of State in transmitting it into Mr. DURAND (interposing). May I say right there, I think that form letter probably was not a form letter to be signed by the Secretary of State. I assume the idea was that the letter should be signed "Federal Trade Commission," and that it was sent to the State Department simply that it might be transmitted through the State Department mail pouches, and the suggestion was made in the letter that the "material is to be used as your judgment may direct." Possibly this was not a correct form letter, and they might wish tó amend the form letter. I think the idea was that the form letter was to be signed by the Federal Trade Commission rather than by the State Department. Mr. LIGHTFOOT. There is nothing in the correspondence itself to disclose that. You are left to draw your own conclusions. In the beginning of this Mr. DURAND (interposing). I am just stating that. Mr. LIGHTFOOT. It was left to the Secretary of State. There is nothing suggested about who was to sign it; and I suppose he sent it through diplomatic channels as was suggested. Mr. VOIGT. That is not so, for the reason that the form letter which is read is signed by the Federal Trade Commission. Mr. LIGHTFOOT. It is not signed at all. Mr. DURAND. Yes; the form letter is. Mr. VEEDER. The form letter in the copy here is. Apparently they intended to send it to these governments, but did not intend to ask the State Department to sign it, but simply suggested the form in which it should go. Mr. KINCHELOE. Let me ask you Mr. LIGHTFOOT (interposing). May I make this statement: I had not read these things for some time. I want to correct my statement or the inference that it was intended that the Secretary of State sign it. Mr. KINCHELOE. I got the impreesion from your statement last night that it was the letter from the State Department to those foreign governments that stated these things, and because of the fact that it being signed by the State Department gave it official status. Now I understand that the only thing that went over there probably was damaging I am not saying that but that it was only excerpts from the Federal Trade Commission's report, and not a letter from the State Department. Mr. LIGHTFOOT. Probably you are correct, in view of my failure to recollect how it was signed. I have not read it for a long time, and this thing came up in a minute. I was speaking from memory. I will say this: That to the extent that you got the impression, or the record shows that we were prejudiced by any letter of the Secretary of State reaching these governments Mr. KINCHELOE (interposing). It mpressed me very much, because any letters with the signature of the Secretary of State reflects very much the influence of this Government. |