Beggar's Banquet

It was a veritable feast, and the 30 members of Congress who sampled the delicious spread of food on Capitol Hill last week did so to make a point: all of the fresh vegetables, fruits and meats served had been salvaged from dumpsters at local supermarkets and wholesale depots after having been discarded as unsold or unsalable.

Groceries like these are routinely retrieved by a local charity to feed some 1,000 of the capital's poor every day. Nationwide, one-fifth of America's food production is wasted in this and other ways every year. Last week's lunch was staged to announce a resolution just introduced in the House that calls on Government and business to help make this lost harvest available for distribution to the needy.

With such cooperation, millions who now go hungry could be fed.

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