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The CHAIRMAN. We have to be realistic. If we go to Congress today and pass 90 percent price supports, in my humble judgment it would be vetoed. That would not solve the problem. We have to add something new that will be acceptable to this administration. That is my judgment.

I want to try, as chairman of this committee, to make every effort to get a bill out that will become law and will affect next year's crop. That is what I am trying to do.

Mr. WINGATE. I will join you and we will, and I don't want to throw any damper on it but it is going to move faster than things have been moving. I have had a lot of experience up there.

The CHAIRMAN. If we wait on the Farm Bureau and some other organization it may be next year or the year after before we do it, but we will not wait for that. We have gone around this country trying to get ideas and it is my hope that the committee itself will act and our views will be followed by the organizations throughout the Nation. Mr. WINGATE. We won't argue with you. I am ready to join you and push this thing through just as rapidly as it is humanly possible. Senator YOUNG. Mr. Wingate, if we took 40 million acres of land out of production quite a large percentage of that would have to be planted to grass, would it not?

Mr. WINGATE. Yes, soil-building crops.

Senator YOUNG. Would we not be limited by the amount of grass seed available as to the amount of acres we could take out? Some of the land taken out of production could be put to other soil-conserving practices but I suppose a sizable part of it would have to be seeded to sweetclover or grass seeds.

Mr. WINGATE. Yes, sir.

Senator YOUNG. If we took out of production, say, 20 million acres, I suppose that 5 million acres would have to be seeded in order to produce enough grass seed to take additional acres out of production? Mr. WINGATE. Yes.

Senator YOUNG. In that respect it would create the need of producing still another crop in much larger volume than we are now, that of grass seed.

Mr. WINGATE. Definitely so. It is something they could step into, Senator, and you would have to expand it very, very fast and it would be a good farmer's crop to produce, the grass seed, the cloverseed, all those things.

Senator YOUNG. In my area sweet clover is a good soil-conserving crop and if you do not harvest it within 2 or 3 weeks after the leaves are off of it it is no longer good for livestock feed but it does make good wildlife cover.

We have had a lot of testimony from witnesses urging that we place the control of production on bushels or bales or other units such as that rather than on acres.

Have you given any thought to that?

Mr. WINGATE. Other than every time we discuss it, I think that is one of the worst things we run into, and I don't think we want to go back to it because when you set the number of bushels a man can sell off his acreage and let him shoot at that, you have the farmer in the worst mess you can put him in. It just won't work. You are going to discourage progress. That is my way of looking at it.

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I don't think you can put it down on balage. If we were running a machine out here and turning out plow points we know just how far and if you tell me how many I can produce I would run up to that and cut the machine off. But when you tell me I can sell so many bales and I don't know how many I will make, under the same conditions, that makes a bad deal for the farmer as I see it.

Senator YOUNG. If he produced too many bales or too many bushels he would have to cut down his production the year after.

Mr. WINGATE. Yes, sir.

Senator YOUNG. Or if he had a poor crop this year and did not produce enough bales he would have a bigger allotment next year. Mr. WINGATE. The best the Government can guess they guess wrong about 2 million bales a year. They started off with 13 million and now it is up to 15 million.

Senator YOUNG. I have a vast respect for your judgment on farm matters.

Mr. WINGATE. Senator, I don't think when you go to figuring what a man can produce and have him figure it out-it is hard and I don't believe it would be a good deal.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Wingate, assuming that it is possible to set aside this 40 million acres, what would be the minimum cotton acreage you would suggest be planted in this country?

Mr. WINGATE. Senator, first I would have to say this. We are going to make up our mind if we are going to sell any in foreign countries and if we are, decide about what, and I would go right along.

The CHAIRMAN. That is the method now. That is how we determine it.

Mr. WINGATE. I know it is, but your State Department right up there, with all due respect to them, it is about as rotten as I ever heard of. I don't know of anything that could be worse.

The CHAIRMAN. That is what we are confronted with. Last year it became so bad that this year it was my privilege as chairman of this committee to appoint a subcommittee headed by my friend, Senator Eastland, and this subcommittee discovered that there were a lot of roadblocks placed in the way whereby the State Department interfered with the sale of some of these commodities.

Mr. WINGATE. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. Have you anything specific you could suggest to stop that?

Mr. WINGATE. The only thing-to stop the State Department.
The CHAIRMAN. I mean-

Mr. WINGATE. Yes, sir; I have one for that, too.

The CHAIRMAN. Would you cut their salaries off or how would you handle it? It is an administrative matter, you know. It is something done from the President on down. They say they want it that way.

Mr. WINGATE. I tell you what, if more of us as Senators, Congressmen, and farm leaders will burn their hides off all over the country.

The CHAIRMAN. You cannot move them.

Mr. WINGATE. They are scared of politics. We should tell the world what they are doing. That is a bad situation.

The CHAIRMAN. There is no doubt about it, that we could move it, but another thing you must consider is the subsidy that would

have to be paid by the Government. You add all that up together and you have a lot of problems that confront us.

Mr. WINGATE. The reason I bring that in about the State Department is if it is going on that way I would have to figure out with it running that way. If we get it so we can move stuff into the markets we would figure a little different story. Regardless, we should have an acreage that will run along in line with our production, domestic and foreign consumption.

Senator EASTLAND. Is it not true if we get a law to give us an export sales program the State Department cannot block it?

Mr. WINGATE. I wouldn't say that, Senator.

Senator EASTLAND. I will say it.

Mr. WINGATE. I don't know. I hope you can. We would be ready to join it.

Senator EASTLAND. We can pass a law and order it sold. How can the State Department block it?

Mr. WINGATE. If I want to get something done like I want it I would rather let you pass the law and let me administer it.

The CHAIRMAN. We have no assurance that even if we pass a law that the President will sign it.

Mr. WINGATE. I agree.

Senator SCHOEPPEL. I apologize for not having been here. I was held up on a long-distance telephone call.

How would you get rid of these surpluses which are, of course, our difficulty?

Mr. WINGATE. Senator, I mentioned this. That the Government took terrific losses in getting rid of surpluses for industry that they put there, scared we would have an all-out war and they piled up a lot of them and the War Production Board sold over $42 billion worth of surplus stuff for less than $7 billion and took a terrific loss.

I say we will have to move this stuff into market even if it takes a subsidy.

Senator SCHOEPPEL. The reason I asked that question is because, first, you would envision changing the present law wherein we have the 105 percent parity limitation plus carrying costs; would that have to be changed?

Mr. WINGATE. Not to sell foreign.

Senator SCHOEPPEL. Domestically?

Mr. WINGATE. I couldn't recommend that. I certainly wouldn't recommend that you make a change in your domestic setup. Senator SCHOEPPEL. I am asking you.

Mr. WINGATE. No, sir; I wouldn't do that. I was talking about the foreign, getting rid of it in foreign countries. We have to subsidize there. I am opposed to subsidizes in this country.

Senator SCHOEPPEL. Now let me ask you this: Have you or your organization-I know you must have checked into the condition of some of the surpluses? Take for instance, wheat. I doubt whether 30 percent of the wheat that the Government owns is good millable wheat. That is tragic as far as I am concerned, to pile up a type of wheat that is not wanted in human consumption.

Would you advocate turning some of that loose for feed in any part of the United States at all?

Mr. WINGATE. Senator, there is a world of it not fit for anything but feed. We have to get it to feed. The quicker you get those poor, off

grades of wheat out of the people's way-we are loaded the same way with cotton. We have a lot of sorry cotton in the loan.

I think we need to do a lot of work on our grading system and get our stored commodities like wheat, cotton, and other things so we will have a real marketable commodity in there and not put heavy loans on these sorry commodities.

Senator SCHOEPPEL. I agree with you, and I am glad to hear you note that.

Do you feel that a good loan differential in favor of the good milling grades of wheat, or in cotton the good grades of cotton, should all command a higher loan value, thereby discouraging the production of the lower or poorer grades?

Mr. WINGATE. Well, I would say put your good grades in at a fair price, but I would discourage the low with lower loans.

Senator SCHOEPPEL. Your organization would have no objection to that?

Mr. WINGATE. Not a bit, sir.

Senator SCHOEPPEL. Have you had any difficulty down here about the very marginal type of farmer, that with these acreage cuts he is cut so low that he is moving out of the farm economy?

Mr. WINGATE. Yes, sir.

Senator SCHOEPPEL. Would you, or do you advocate any minimum consideration that should be given to that individual whether he be cotton, rice, wheat, corn, or any of these other types of farmer that fall into that classification? In other words, should we have a minimum before starting to cut acreages?

Mr. WINGATE. Let me say my organization is not on record to stop any minimum and I don't mind saying what I think myself about it. I want to say this: I think this soil bank program that we were talking about a while ago will put us in a position that these small farmers can sell something besides basic commodities and get some money out of it. He can take 2 or 3 cattle or a few hogs and sell other commodities and get something out of it if those prices are right and that is what we should do.

I think that will help that small farmer, but on that small acerage I can only give you this: the experience they have had in burley, and they really were sick over that. They started out on that several years. ago with a minimum acreage and now they are all down to the minimum acreage.

The CHAIRMAN. I am glad to note so many Congressmen and Congresswomen from Georgia are here. I wish to say that on our trip so far, we have before us today the largest number of Congressmen from any State. We are very much pleased with that.

În addition to the ones I mentioned a moment ago we have Con-gresswoman Blitch, Congressman Pilcher, and my good friend, Congressman Preston.

Mr. WINGATE. On that small acreage deal I would like to come back to that. One thing that will help these small-acreage fellows is if we can get premeasurement of acres. We have a world of small farmers and you go out and he measures his acreage and he can't get it just right. And no criticism; I am not inclined to criticize somebody. They are doing the best they can. But you get a man to come out there from ASC and measure it and get a second one to measure it and you can get some people that think they really know and measure it, and

they will all get different measurements. That farmer is tired plowing under and so he plows up and tries to keep from running over and it is cutting his acreage all along. It is cutting his acreage.

If we could get this acreage premeasured and staked off and penalties for farmers after that, and let them go back to see if it is planted, you would help us keep from losing very much needed acreage that we are losing.

The CHAIRMAN. Is it not a fact that on a lot of the controlled acres, a farmer plants a little more so that in the event that what he plants does not come up he can plow it up?

Mr. WINGATE. No, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. We have a different situation in other parts of the country.

Mr. WINGATE. Not one out of a thousand will do it here in this State. We are trying to be honest and do our part and we are losing

acres.

The CHAIRMAN. We have had evidence to indicate that in many States in the planting of wheat it is common practice to plant much more acreage than that which is allocated and then later on plow it up. You say that is not the practice in Georgia?

Mr. WINGATE. No, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Whatever acres the farmer thinks is the correct measurement is what he plants?

Mr. WINGATE. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. Then he takes a chance that the acreage he measured will correspond with the measurement that will be made by whoever does it later?

Mr. WINGATE. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, I am very anxious for this committee to obtain from you, if you will, any other plans as to the disposition of this surplus. You mentioned, and we are in agreement, that the State Department has been in the way and that they do not want to hurt, as it were, the economy of other countries by dumping our cotton. Mr. WINGATE. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, do you not believe that it is a matter that is really in the hands of the President? Do you not think he is the one, if he would only tell the Secretary of State to do it, it would be done? Mr. WINGATE. No question; and I don't believe you can pass a law and get it signed. În other words, if the President vetoes it-I think you are just up against that and you will have to decide that later.

The CHAIRMAN. Are there any other suggestions you have, Mr. Wingate?

Senator EASTLAND. Let me ask a question there.

Mr. Wingate, I agree we have to keep controls. I want to ask you this question: We were under acreage controls back in the 1930's. They were taken off in 1943. What was the surplus of cotton at that time?

Mr. WINGATE. They were taken off in 1943?

Senator EASTLAND. Or the 1944 crop.

Mr. WINGATE. The surplus of cotton at that time was about 10 million bales.

Senator EASTLAND. Was it not 13 million bales?

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