PARAGRAPH 225-CATTLE.

gate of their business the great majority of butchers have not accumulated very much, partly because a small business after paying the expense of living, no matter what the profits are in percentages, does not yield an aggregate approaching on wealth, and partly because of the small volume of the business in the great majority of the butcher shops throughout the country.

There seems to be no particular ratio between the retail price and the wholesale price. As we have stated above, we are not able to furnish the retail prices. Every one is a purchaser and he may judge for himself, but we present herewith the wholesale prices of beef at several of the representative cities of the United States and the average wholesale price at Washington City, and the wholesale prices of American beef at London substantially on the same dates, or at all events about the same periods, so that if you see fit you may judge for yourselves and the public who may read what is here presented what the relation is and what it ought to be between the wholesale price and the retail price of beef. And you may likewise judge whether there is any ratio that pertains between the wholesale and retail prices of beef. To our minds the fact of 1 or 2 cents per hundred pounds in the wholesale price cuts little, if any. figure, in the retail price. The following is submitted as the wholesale prices of beef, and the sources of the information are stated in connection with each of the tables submitted:

Average wholesale price per pound for River Plata mutton and beef at Central Meat Market, London, 1898-1911.1

[Compiled from London market reports showing the wholesale prices per pound of River Plata mutton and beef at Central Meat Market, in London, from 1898 to December 1912.]

PARAGRAPH 225-CATTLE.

Wholesale prices of dressed beef.

[Data to date for Chicago and New York from January, 1907, to January, 1913; Boston and San Francisco

not available.]

[Cents per pound.]

Chicago.

Carcass,

steers.

light and heavy.

pounds.

PARAGRAPH 225-CATTLE.

Wholesale price of beef in the city of Washington, D. C.-Continued.

Average weekly price per head for native (criollas) fat steers at Buenos Aires, 1899-1912.1

Prior to July 1, 1904, the exact dates to which these prices refer are not given in the Review of the River Plata, but an effort has been made in this table to quote prices for the first business week of each month named.

PARAGRAPH 225-CATTLE.

Average weekly price per head for native (criollas) fat steers at Buenos Aires, 1899–1912— Continued.

All animals are raised, and if not raised by the feeder they are purchased at the central market and not generally bought directly from the range, so that the farmer becomes equally interested with respect to the price of the finished product with the growers and feeders, so called, from whom he purchases.

As is well known, the price of cattle for the past two years has been good, and has afforded a reasonable profit to the producer. But there is no chance whatsoever for the producer to have encouragement to continue production except where the incentive lies in the price which he may obtain for what he raises either from what he raises and fattens for the market or from what he raises and fattens for somebody else to put on the market.

From what has been shown it seems clear that the price of cattle has advanced, and but for that we would not produce the supply we have to-day, which would result in decreased production of cattle.

If the duty on cattle and meats is removed and cattle and meats are landed in this country without such duty, it will demoralize the business. No man will engage in the business of cattle breeding away from local farms unless the price tempts him to take a chance on the investment, and he must have the place to carry on his business, to procure which he must now pay a very large increased cost on land. Singularly enough, it seems to us, the Government has been too short-sighted in failing to lease its public lands and thus enable stock raisers to engage in a breeding business.

The benefits which might possibly flow from the free introduction of meats from foreign countries would be far exceeded were the United States to adopt a policy of renting the public lands on some basis which would induce the breeder of cattle in our own country to use the land, which is so largley vacant and unoccupied, for that purpose and now utilized for only nomadic grazing.

What is the use of Congress trying to secure cheaper meats from countries which can grow cattle cheaper than we can, when lying at our own doors are vast areas of public lands of the United States which the laws forbid anyone to fence, and thus forbid anyone to occupy as a breeding and grazing ranch? There are 300,000,000 acres of land in this country belonging to the United States which are practically

PARAGRAPH 225-CATTLE.

unfit for settlement, which, if leased in large enough quantities to induce private capital to test for water by wells, would be leased and fenced, and thus induce the establishment thereon of breeding ranches, as well as increase the cattle production of the United States. If Congress is so interested in procuring the cheapest meats that can be afforded in this country, why resort to putting cattle and meats on the free list when the opportunity for increased production in our country is so patent? For lack of popularity the subject has not been much agitated in Congress. Nomadic grazing has led many people, some of whom are in Congress, to desire a continuance of that condition, notwithstanding the fact that the example of leasing Indian reservations and the use of the forest reserves has demonstrated the fact that the public lands can be used to increase the cattle in the United States on the only cheap lands which we have available for that purpose.

To bring the cattle producer of this country into competition with the cheapest labor and the cheapest lands in Mexico, and with the cheapest labor and cheapest lands in South America, by placing cattle on the free list and by placing meats on the free list, would be a crime against the Nation.

Why should we give to Mexico, the northern half of which is as good a breeding country as is western Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, or southern California, the free markets for cattle, and thus raise the price of their lands while reducing the price of ours, when lying at our doors are vast areas in the semiarid regions of the United States which could be as well utilized as are the lands in Mexico, without an opportunity for private control and development of our own lands afforded to those who would as readily engage in the business as those who would engage in it in Mexico?

Even Mexico has no such absurd policy of leaving its land unoccupied and idle where the men with means to do so desire to acquire the same for the purpose of breeding cattle, developing water, and otherwise making the lands useful for the present and future.

As to the result of placing Mexican cattle upon the free list, it may fairly be said that this country could gain no benefit therefrom. As heretofore shown, the imports for 11 months amounted to 268,891, which is less than 1 per cent of the total number of cattle of this country other than milch cows, as shown by the preceding statement. If placed on the free list, the value of cattle in Mexico would simply be advanced by the amount of the tariff, and the Government would be deprived of the revenue.

It is currently reported, but we are not prepared to prove it, that contracts for the sale of cattle which move to the United States are bing made in Mexico on the condition that if the Congress of the United States removes the duty then the amount of the duty will be added to the contract price. Naturally this is so, because cattle bought in Mexico to be brought to the United States must pay the duty. This being the market, and the only market for such cattle, the price is fixed in Mexico by the American standard, and the importer must pay the duty. We can not expect that the owner of cattle in Mexico would have little enough sense to sell his cattle for less than the American price for the same quality could they be brought to this country free. So, therefore, whether such stipulations are made or not in contracts, that would be the result.

Any result which must necessarily follow would be an increase in the value of grazing lands in Mexico, which sell at an average of not more than 50 cents per acre, and a consequent decrease in the value of grazing lands in the United States but without an increase in the value of cattle until the vast areas in Mexico could be occupied and the breeding of cattle resumed and extended, which would require several years. It must not be overlooked that it takes five years to produce a 4-year

old beef steer.

Once the cattle-raising business in the United States is led to understand that it must compete with production in the cheapest producing countries of the world, the discouragement will inevitably lead to a reduction in the number of cattle bred, raised, and fed in the United States.

It needs no argument to show that such a result brings disaster to the business, disaster to the farmers, and disaster to every interest dependent upon the production of live stock.

So we have come to the point in this argument that the public can not benefit by endeavoring to enforce a business to be carried on without profit, because if it must be so carried on it must case. Regardless of whatever system of laws brings about such result, in the end who is to be benefited?

If it is proper to put cattle and meat on the free list then every other food product ought to be placed upon the free list. If it is proper to do that, everything we wear ought to be placed upon the free list. If it is proper to do that, everything we buy