Cotton by Quota

"I am voting for this measure with all my fingers and toes crossed," said Senator Barkley of Kentucky. ''I am voting for it," said Senator Stephens of Mississippi, ''with strong misgivings, with grave doubts." "I am voting against it,'' said Senator Gore of Oklahoma, ''because the farmers are winding a boa constrictor around their necks. . . . If this measure is constitutional anything is constitutional.''

Despite crossed fingers and toes, strong misgivings and grave doubts the Senate last week passed (46-to-39) a bill by the Brothers Bankhead of Alabama to limit cotton production by penalties instead of bribes.

Last year the Agricultural Adjustment Administration ladled out $100,000,000 in domestic allotments to cotton growers who destroyed a quarter of their crop. But good growing weather and human avarice thwarted the AAA program with the result that the 1933 cotton crop was even larger than that for 1932. To force crop cuts Senator John Hollis Bankhead and Representative William B. Bankhead persuaded the Administration to endorse their measure to tax surplus production out of existence rather than to try to spirit it off the market with cash. Last month the House passed (251-to-115) the bill to assign each planter a bale quota based on his past production and then tax him 50% of the market value of each bale ginned in excess of that quota. Prime purpose of the legislation was to hold the 1934 cotton crop down to 10,000,000 bales.

Before it passed the House measure last week the Senate upped the tax provision to 75% of the market price, limited the law's operation to one year and finally, at the demand of North Carolina's Bailey, tacked on an amendment which would practically nullify the whole purpose of the bill. The amendment allowed each & every cotton farmer to gin at least six tax-free bales, regardless of quota. Inasmuch as there are about 2,000,000 cotton farmers, that meant a total of 12,000,000 bales even before restrictions were applied.

Punishment for breaking the law was set at $100 fine or one year in prison. To the last provision was added the following unprecedented language, devised by blind Senator Gore in cynical comment on the legislative powers being given over to the Administration:

"Any person who willfully violates any penal statute enacted by the Secretary of Agriculture . . . under this act for the violation of which a special penalty is not provided shall on conviction thereof, be punished by a fine not exceeding $200. . . . "

Well did all Senators know that these amendments would kill the effectiveness of the bill and cause the courts to declare it unconstitutional. But Cotton States' Senators were afraid to vote against it, hoped to shear off the amendments in conference with the House.

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