proved to be a workable and effective statute and S. 1460 would place the standard barrels and baskets established by the older laws on the same basis.

S. 1460 also contains some new provisions for standardizing containers for fruits and vegetables. One of these would require the marking of such containers to show the identity of the manufacturer and the capacity of the container. Another seeks to obviate any interference with State laws and city ordinances with respect to the sale of fruits and vegetables by weight. A third would require annual reports of production by manufacturers and the submission of sample containers when required by the Secretary of Agriculture.

The most important provisions of S. 1460, however, is one to extend the principle of container standardization to include drums, cartons, crates, and boxes. Under existing statutes manufacturers of drums, cartons, crates, and boxes can make containers of capacities which manufacturers of baskets are forbidden to make. This places basket manufacturers at a disadvantage in competing with manufacturers of such containers, cartons particularly. An amendment to the Standard Container Act of 1916, enacted by the Seventy-third Congress, to legalize a 1-pound climax basket for mushrooms was an effort to enable basket manufacturers to compete with carton manufacturers in this field. S. 1460, through the provision of section 7, is comprehensive and broad enough to take care of such situations, and if passed, would obviate the necessity of Congressional action in similar instances. Carton manufacturers have shown a disposition to cooperate with the Department and it is believed no serious opposition would be encountered in placing them on an equal basis with basket manufacturers.

Constant confusion and numerous disputes in the terminal markets and distributing centers arise from the use of wooden crates and boxes of various sizes and shapes. The multiplicity of sizes, designs, and construction of such containers probably adds appreciably to the cost of marketing the products packed in them, contributes to the loss and waste due to damage in transit and in handling, complicates the dissemination of accurate and comparable market information, and encourages the perpetration of fraud and deception in the sale of the products for which such containers are used.

Numerous illustrations of the need for standardization in such containers might be cited as, for example, green peas are shipped from the West in standard 1-bushel hampers and also in crates of various sizes, many of which bear no direct relation to the standard bushel. Southern shippers of green and bunched vegetables use several types of packages, such as the standard round or flat bottom bushel basket and crates of various sizes.

The multiplicity of crates and boxes used in Western States for fruits and vegetables is a matter of common knowledge and comment. Some of these States have set up certain standards, by law, for crates and boxes. These standards, however, vary somewhat in different States and in some instances States have provided that containers not recognized by law may be used if not marked "standard" or if marked "irregular." What this may lead to with respect to containers for a given commodity is shown by the fact that for cherries ten sizes of boxes have been standardized by State laws but that, as a matter of fact 18 other and different sizes of boxes are used. A similar confusing situation exists with regard to so-called "fruit boxes" and "lug" boxes which are used for a number of different fruits and vegetables.

One specific example of confusion which has gradually crept in because of lack of any regulation is that of the Florida citrus box. For years the Florida citrus box (1% bushels) and the half box (% bushels) have been accepted as standard even though they differed from the California box. During recent years several additional sizes and shapes have appeared and are recognized by the railway container tariff applying in the Florida area. So that there are of the citrus box type 11 packages in all, exclusive of the 2- and 1-bushel standard baskets which are also used.

One crate or box recently introduced has created more than the usual amount of interest and has served to focus attention on the need of some kind of Federal regulation of such containers. This crate was adopted last year by a committee representing several New England States and New York State as an open crate designed to hold without too much arrangement of the fruit the quantity of apples contained in standard bushel baskets as commonly packed. Consequently, as commonly made, it has a cubical capacity just slightly less than 1% bushels, and was perhaps well suited to the original intended purpose. However, as its use became more wide-spread it was found necessary and desirable to exercise some care in packing the crate and also to use some kind of a cover on it. Consequently,

it has changed from an "open, return" package to a "closed-gift" package, and as such is variously marked 1%, 1% bushels "minimum 1 bushel", etc.

Thus we have a group of communities establishing by agreement a so-called "standard" crate which is not based on any definite standard such as a bushel, but on that variable and indefinite quantity, the "heaped bushel." No one has ever determined just what the heap on a bushel should be and apparently it is not determinable. Closed containers must be packed with a slight bulge in order that the container may present a tight appearance after the contents have shaken down in transit. The demand in receiving markets is always for a greater and greater bulge-a higher and higher heap. As soon as the crate in question has ceased to be an open, return package and becomes a closed, gift package it is plain that the growers will be compelled to pack it with a bulge pack, and in the end they will be giving from 1 to 11⁄2 bushels for the price of a bushel. proponents of this crate are actively engaged in promoting its use in the Northeastern States and New York and desire to see it used in the other apple-growing sections in the South and Midwest. Only through the standardization of crates and boxes can proposals so unfair to growers be controlled.

The

So far as baskets and barrels are concerned this bill proposes no new standards. The principal change which it would make is to provide for the regulation of crates, boxes, and cartons. The use of cartons for fruits and vegetables is comparatively new and the manufacturers of these containers have manifested a desire to keep in line, so far as trade pressure permits, with the standards laid down in the existing laws. The great increase in the last few years in the use of crates and boxes in various prosections in place of baskets is rapidly bringing about a condition of affairs so far as these containers are concerned as undesirable as that which existed with regard to baskets and barrels before the present laws were enacted. Only a few States have made any attempt to regulate any of these containers and, as has been pointed out, no great degree of standardization has been brought about in this way. It appeared at one time as though the railroads through their container tariffs might play a great part in standardizing these packages. However, in recent years the railroads have weakened considerably in the position they once adopted and have shown a disposition to include in their tariffs any containers asked for by large shippers or important shipping sections.

It has become more and more apparent that if the conditions now existing are not to grow worse they must be corrected through Federal legislation. It is realized that a new proposal of this sort will not meet with the approval of all those whose containers are to be regulated. Our experience with the legislation now on the statute books shows this, but our experience also shows that once such legislation is on the statute books and is fairly and impartially enforced these objections disappear.

We believe that the enactment of the proposed bill into law will facilitate the enforcement of the standards which Congress has already established and that benefits similar to those which have accrued from the standardization so far accomplished will also be realized from the extension of the principle of standardization to crates, boxes, and cartons.

As the Standard Apple Barrel Law and the Standard Barrel Law are now as signed to the Department of Commerce, the opinion of that Department regarding their consolidation into one statute dealing with containers for fruits and vegetables as contemplated by S. 1460 to be administered by this Department has been requested and we are advised there is no objection on the part of that Department to such a measure.

Mr. MURPHY, from the Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, submitted the following

REPORT

[To accompany S. 12]

The Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, to whom the bill (S. 12) to amend the Packers and Stockyards Act was referred, having considered the same, recommend that the bill do pass without amend

ment.

A bill similar to this one was introduced during the last session of Congress and was known as "S. 2246" and passed the Senate on June 14, 1934.

This bill is intended to add a new title V to the Packers and Stockyards Act, approved August 15, 1921, and is designed to bring the shipment of poultry within the jurisdiction of the Secretary of Agriculture.

The facts set out below have been secured from a memorandum from the Committee on Crime and Criminal Practices after an investigation made by them.

Poultry comes from the western and southern States largely to New York and Jersey City. It is brought in special cars for poultry. When unloaded the birds are put into wooden coops, each of which holds about 20 birds, and which are very cheap, costing about $2. They are then loaded on trucks for distribution to the several markets and then taken to the various markets where they are unloaded.

In order to take the birds from the car they are put into coops which are rented from a concern having a monopoly and $1 a trip is charged for them. Two men are employed to fill the coops. To lift the coops from platform to truck, two more men must be employed and the truck must be owned by the monopoly controlling the transportation of live poultry. After crossing the ferry two more men must be employed to lift the coop from the truck to the pavement.

The cost of the transportation has been more than doubled by reason of the excessive charges made through these methods demanded in the handling of poultry in the terminal. For 5 days consumed in

the transportation, for instance, from Iowa City to Jersey City, it costs about $321. For the 5 hours it takes to unload the poultry and deliver it to the markets, for instance, from Jersey City to New York City, it costs around $387. If the right trucks and coops are not hired, the poultry will never reach its destination in salable condition. The poultry "racket" has become one of the most outrageously dishonest and corrupt and vile industries known. This outrageous procedure costs the consumers hundreds of thousands of dollars every year. It is an interstate "racket" which by the enactment of this bill we hope to control. If the live poultry industry is placed under the Packers and Stockyards Act, thereby establishing a correct and reasonable charge for all services rendered at the unloading point in destination of shipment, the foregoing corrupt "racket" will be eliminated.

74TH CONGRESS 1st Session

SENATE

{

REPORT No. 489

WOLF POINT, MONT.-COOPERATION WITH SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 45, ROOSEVELT COUNTY

APRIL 15, 1935.-Ordered to be printed

Mr. WHEELER, from the Committee on Indian Affairs, submitted the

following

REPORT

[To accompany S. 1523]

The Committee on Indian Affairs, to whom was referred the bill (S. 1523) to provide funds for cooperation with the public-school board at Wolf Point, Mont., in the construction or improvement of a public-school building to be available to Indian children of the Fort Peck Indian Reservation, Mont., having considered the same, report thereon with a recommendation that it do pass without amendment.

This is in accord with the present Indian education policy of cooperating wherever feasible with local public-school authorities in the schooling of Indian children.

This legislation is necessary to relieve an overcrowded situation in the public schools of Wolf Point, due to the increasing number of Indian children in attendance. Of the 350 children in the elementary grades, 85 are Indian; of 279 high-school pupils, 15 are Indians. There is also a rural school under the Wolf Point school board with 30 Indian pupils, a total of 136 Indian children in the Wolf Point system-an increase of over 30 percent since last year. The Bureau of Indian Affairs has been urging the public school to provide home economics and shop work to a greater extent than at present, but the school plant is so crowded that it is impossible to do adequate work without an increase in facilities. The resources of the school district have been materially reduced because of the existence of nontaxable Indian land, approximately 63 percent of the area of the district consisting of such nontaxable Indian land.

Estimates presented to the Committee by the Department state that the Wolf Point School will in all probability have from 160 to 170 Indian children during the next school year. It is essential to provide facilities for these children. It would be considerably more

8. Repts., 74-1, vol. 1--57