Mr. HOLMAN. Not at all.

Senator THYE. You note that the bill provides for a National Agricultural Council, consisting of four members appointed by the President, and confirmed by the Senate, one member to represent the interest of producers, one to represent the interest of processors, one to represent the interest of distributors, and one to represent the interest of consumers. The person representing the producer group might be you yourself, and I would trust you to speak most forcefully for all of agriculture.

It would be either you or someone else equally as well qualified as you are to represent the producer group. I do believe that unless we give some thought to the consumer phase, the program will be short-lived. However, I wanted to point out the provision for appointment of a producer member.

Mr. HOLMAN. I would hate to be the one producer member of such a board.

Senator THYE. Of the four appointed by the President, one is a producer. Another is a processor and of course he might not in any sense be favorable to the farm program. I admit that, but then the distributor member would again be a producer member.

Then you have a consumer.

You have one out of the entire council who would be the voice of the consumer groups.

Mr. HOLMAN. Senator, you have not had as much experience with consumers' councils as we have had.

Senator THYE. I admit that we have not had the experience you have had.

Mr. HOLMAN. The consumers' council of the Department of Agriculture was the most complete and total pest that America ever had, irrespective of personnel that occupied the post. Nothing of a really public-spirited character came out of the advice of the consumers' council, but only propaganda inimical to farmers came out.

Now our thesis lies in two regards here. First, we do not believe there is any necessity for the Congress creating a national agricultural council. Secondly, if it should be created, we do not think it would be an agricultural council whatsoever.

Senator AIKEN. Not even, Mr. Holman, if elected by the farmers themselves? I cannot conceive of a more democratic way of getting representation of the farmers than by election from the grass roots. Do you think that the farmers would not elect men to the council who would represent them?

Mr. HOLMAN. Senator, from the very construction of the act, the county councils are not necessarily farmers, the State councils are not necessarily farmers.

Senator AIKEN. But they are elected by farmers.

Mr. HOLMAN. A few of them; not all of them. Some of them are appointed bodies like the men who are handling conservation and things of that kind.

Senator AIKEN. I mean under this bill.

Mr. HOLMAN. Under this bill is what I am describing. If you examine the bill, you will find you have not provided for a purely agricultural operation.

Senator AIKEN. You are worried for fear that the farmers of a county would elect lawyers and doctors?

Mr. HOLMAN. I have no doubt that there will be bankers, lawyers, board of supervisors, that might not be farmers.

Senator AIKEN. They could not be elected without the vote of the farmers.

Mr. HOLMAN. They might.

Senator AIKEN. How?

Mr. HOLMAN. The towns would have votes for county supervisors down in my county.

Senator AIKEN. This bill would restrict the votes to farmers.

Mr. HOLMAN. I have not found any restriction as far as the language is concerned.

Senator AIKEN. Oh, yes. There is no intention to let anybody but farmers vote for these committees. Personally, I think farmers, the ones right on the farms, have the right to elect their own representatives. I cannot conceive of any more democratic process than having the farmers themselves elect their committees.

Mr. HOLMAN. Senator, I cannot conceive of a democratic process being set up by the Congress to set up an agency of persons who are in a quasi-official position in the counties and the States and a highly official position in Washington, D. C., which is to be recognized as the agency which the Congress and the departments will refer to when here are the organizations of the farmers' ownership and choosing which will be shoved aside.

Senator AIKEN. If they were doing good work they would not be shoved aside.

Mr. HOLMAN. That is the question.

Senator AIKEN. And if they are not doing good work they ought to be shoved aside.

Mr. HOLMAN. I do not see how a small body of men of this kind could possibly be more representative than what we now have in these great farmers' organizations, the great cooperative organizations which are doing their best and they are paying for it themselves, and they are not getting anything out of tax money. We fundamentally are opposed to this move because we think it is a move to fascism.

Senator AIKEN. Do you consider it is a move toward fascism to let the farmers choose their own representatives instead of having a half-dozen directors come in here and choose the representatives?

Which do you think is the more representative of the farmers? Mr. HOLMAN. I think the farm organizations of today choose their own representatives.

Senator AIKEN. I think it is time for the farmers to choose their own representatives. They would get better representatives.

You object to the farmers voting for their own representatives, that is what it amounts to, Mr. Holman.

Mr. HOLMAN. I object to this method of setting up the pseudo agricultural organization.

Senator AIKEN. Which provides for election by the representatives themselves.

Mr. HOLMAN. And giving official status which they should not have according to our own people's views on it.

Senator AIKEN. Anyway, I think the testimony is clear on that point, but I say, let the farmers have the right to run their own affairs as far as possible.

Mr. HOLMAN. That is what we say and we do not believe that will be possible under this construction as set up in this particular bill. Senator YOUNG. You do not think it advisable to have a consumer representative on such a board as that?

Mr. HOLMAN. On an agricultural council.

Senator YOUNG. Well, it would be nice if we could run our own show and get what we wanted out of Congress, but it would seem to me to be to our advantage to have some minority representation on there. We would be in a stronger position.

Mr. HOLMAN. If the Congress is going to set up another board I would say that the terms and conditions of appointment would be a matter of concern with us, but they should be specified. This proposes to be an interlocking Government-controlled and-supervised semiofficial farm group and we just simply regard it as having possibilities of evil operation rather than good.

Senator YOUNG. Their main job would be just in an advisory position, would it not?

The council itself?

Mr. HOLMAN. Well, I do not know what is intended by the committee or by the authors of the bill. When they give to a body of this kind the right to hold hearings as deputies of the Congress, when they give that same right to individuals of the committees to hold hearings as deputies and to make recommendations, they do not give that to anybody else in the world.

Senator YOUNG. Well, it would seem to me, for instance, that if they held a hearing in some large city on the question of food supplies and prices, the fact that you had a majority of farmers there and a consumer representative, it would be at least an opportunity in a good way to present the farmers' side of it.

It may have some objections, Mr. Holman, but I can see a lot of advantage to it.

Mr. HCLMAN. We cannot see any advantage to setting up what in the next paragraph I am calling a hybrid agricultural organization. There is nothing to protect the structure in the local district, in the local country, or in the State, and so far as the set-up of the national council is concerned, the President appoints one producer, he appoints one processor, he appoints one distributor, and he appoints one consumer. Then there are four to be chosen by these State councils and there is nothing in the bill, as we see it, and we may be wrong, which guarantees that even the State councils will have a majority of farmers in their structure.

Senator YOUNG. Would it help if the President would have to make his selection from a list presented by various organizations?

Mr. HOLMAN. It might help but we challenge the thesis. We think this National Council is a thoroughly and totally unnecessary body. We think that Congress is delegating some of the duties and responsibilities that today rests in committees, such as the committee before which I have the honor to appear.

Senator YOUNG. Since present price-support legislation expires this year, do you think that we could write our own ticket in Congress and get it through as a purely agricultural set-up without giving any consideration to the consumers?

Mr. HOLMAN. I think you can set up an administrative board and give the board certain rules to guide them and you will have a much

more responsible body than you possibly could have by setting up a quasi-political machine.

I think it is entirely within the possibility of a board or a delegation of powers to the Secretary or to any other person to administer. I do think the Congress should always determine the rules to guide the administrator of the operation.

We came before this committee some months ago and laid before this committee a stabilization program, which would require a board to operate and which we think would bring about some practical businesslike actions, but in this thing all we can see is something which the Congress sets up, which will be between the free farmers' organizations such as I represent, and the Congress itself.

We can see if this thing fastens itself onto the public purse and entwines itself into the political structure of the Nation where we will even reach a point possibly where we cannot get to the Secretary or the Cabinet officers, and we may not be able to get to the committees.

We may be told, "You will have to have your hearing before this group which we are delegating; we are too busy. We will just delegate it to the National Council to handle this thing."

We think the thing is entirely unnecessary and will be obnoxious to the farmers of the country before we get through.

Senator YOUNG. I am sure the committee welcomes your testimony. You are a bit critical of a committee that is trying to do its best to inaugurate a long-range program. The bill is only a tentative draft. The committee, I am sure, welcomes all criticism and constructive suggestions.

Mr. HOLMAN. I appreciate that and while I recognize that a majority of the committee have sponsored the bill, the bill is still before the committee and could hardly be considered the present policy of the committee until there is a decision by it.

I am only speaking under the direction of our people to express their views and if I am a little bit overly emphatic, it is only because they feel rather keenly about it.

I have always appreciated the fine courtesy and the spirit of the committee and we have the greatest confidence in the eventual judgment of the committee, but we do feel we have a duty to express to the committee how we feel about the setting up of the proposed organization.

Senator AIKEN. You say you would set up a board. How would you set up a board?

Mr. HOLMAN. Mr. Brandt explained to this committee a rather elaborate program of setting up a price stabilization board. Senator AIKEN. Who is Mr. Brandt?

Mr. HOLMÁN. Mr. Brandt is our president.
Senator AIKEN. How would it be set up?

Mr. HOLMAN. It would have to be set up by Presidential appointment, confirmed by the Senate.

Senator AIKEN. Is that more democratic than it would be to have a board elected by the farmers and appointed by the Secretary?

Mr. HOLMAN. Senator, it is more in line with the tradition of American Government than to set up an organization which has in it all the potentialities of becoming a political machine.

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Senator AIKEN. How would you have any assurance that that board would represent farmers any more than the one elected by the farmers themselves?

Mr. HOLMAN. Well, we never have assurance of any board but we do know it is a board and it does not have behind it an organized political articulating machine that goes into every county and every community in the county.

Senator AIKEN. Would a board elected by the farmers necessarily be a political machine when elected by the farmers of all parties in all regions?

Mr. HOLMAN. I think it has a very great chance of doing so. The Senator recalls how nearly a political machine the AAA action committees became.

Senator AIKEN. You think then that political considerations do not enter into the Presidential appointments?

Mr. HOLMAN. I think they do.

Senator YOUNG. Why would they not enter in also with this board? Mr. HOLMAN. I think also there is some check on the Presidential appointment by the Senate as to the character of the men and most of these appointments provide for the two-party system, most boards. Shall I proceed?

The CHAIRMAN. Yes.

Mr. HOLMAN. The bill, we believe, embodies further delegation by Congress of its powers to administrative agencies of the Government. We have had too much of such delegation in the past. Congress represents the people and is responsive to the will of the people. Government bureaucracies generally are less responsive. The National Agricultural Council is a hybrid agency which its four most important members appointed by the President and subject to removal by him. It is bound to be controlled almost entirely by the Executive since these four men and the one selected by the National Association of Land Grant Colleges and Universities will constitute a majority of the Council. It should be recalled that the land-grant colleges are in a great measure dependent upon appropriations by the Congress adininistered by the Department of Agriculture.

We therefore again urgently request elimiantion of this entire section (110) setting up a National Agricultural Council.

Finally, with respect to this phase of our testimony, our people will not receive with favor the Congress with respect to agricultural problems delegating the power to hold hearings to the National Council and individual members of the Council either upon request of congressional committee or upon their own initiative. Such a procedure is revolutionary and destructive of the customary methods by which the Congress obtains its information. These are investigations made by_committee-employed experts and by the committee hearings pro

cedure.

At this point, I close my part of the direct statement and Mr. Herrmann will take on the remainder of the paper unless there are some questions.

Senator AIKEN. I notice, Mr. Holman, you are making this statement by direction of the Federation's executive committee. How many members do you have on the executive committee?

Mr. HOLMAN. There are 11 members on the committee.