BREAD BILL COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE, The committee met, pursuant to adjournment of Saturday, March 1, 1924, at 10 o'clock a. m., Hon. Gilbert N. Haugen (chairman) presiding. Present: Representatives Haugen (chairman), Purnell, Voigt, Williams, Sinclair, Thompson, Clarke, Ketcham, Aswell, Rubey, Johnson, Doyle, and McSweeney. Mr. BRAND. Mr. Chairman, how much time are we going to have this morning? The CHAIRMAN. Until 12 o'clock. Mr. BRAND. I would like to have some time for rebuttal. I do not care whether it is this morning or not. Mr. RABENOLD. We desire an hour, Mr. Chairman. Mr. ASWELL. Mr. Chairman, wasn't this day set aside for the opposition to the bill? The CHAIRMAN. Yes. Mr. ASWELL. We gave the other side two days. The CHAIRMAN. Very well, Mr. Rabenold, you may proceed. STATEMENT OF ELWOOD M. RABENOLD, NEW YORK CITY Mr. RABENOLD. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I represent the American Bakers' Association, particularly its public relations committee. Mr. ASWELL. Are you for this bill, Mr. Rabenold? Mr. RABENOLD. I would like to present our attitude with respect to the general subject of legislation. If I say I am opposed to the bill, that may go further than our attitude. May it please the committee, there is one observation I would like to make at the outset, just by way of clearing away any possible misconception with respect to this kind of legislation. From the beginning of the discussion that we had upon the first day of the hearing the words "short-weight bread" were recurringly used. Upon that phrase "short-weight bread" has been predicated a rather laborious argument that speaks in terms of money loss to the American public. I hardly need to point out that to speak of short-weight bread necessarily assumes that there is such a thing as full-weight bread. That, however, is the very question we have before us, as to what is full-weight bread, so that an argument from the standpoint of short-weight bread is, of course; begging the question. The baking industry had just one primary desire in appearing before your committee this morning, and that is to bring to you, as earnestly as we can, the desire on the part of the baking industry to do its utmost in the interest of the public. That may be altruistic, but necessarily flows from the fact that the baking industry to-day, possibly more than any other industry, is affected with a public interest. There is no business, as we know only too well, that presents more sharply competitive conditions than the baking industry. There is no sharp competition in the baking industry between the various parts of the baking industry, but the competition is between the commercial baker on the one hand and the housewife on the other. We can not possibly increase our business to-day without competing successfully with the housewife. Competition that is directed merely to taking away from a fellow baker some trade that he may have is in the end a ruinous competition, a competition ruinous to the industry itself and a competition that is ruinous to the consumer. But the real competition, which we assure you is a very earnest competition in the baking industry, is with the housewife, in whose keeping the future of the baking industry is, because if we can not successfully compete with her and demonstrate to her discriminating taste that we can outdo her in the production of foodstuffs for the household, the baking industry never can be the success that we desire to make it. So you can perceive that there could not possibly be absent from our thoughts at any moment the public interest, satisfaction to the public, which means the housewife as well as the consumers. I say that at the outset, because when we approach any legislative committee apparently in opposition to legislation we do try to impress the committee that we are not opposed to any requirement that shall more carefully harmonize the baking industry with the interests of the public. pre That leads me, then, to express to you the only issue that is sented by this bill. The only issue, the major issue, upon which there is a difference of opinion, is this: The Brand bill presents a proposition that bread shall be manufactured in standard units of a pound, a pound and a half, and multiples of a pound. You will perceive that that has nothing to do with the quantity; it has nothing to do with the price. It is an effort to make bread a standard unit in the state of manufacture. Now, the argument for it is, or ought to be, that that involves a representation of quantity to the consumer, that the consumer is entitled to know how much bread is offered or sold for a given price. If the legislation stopped there the baking industry would be in entire accord. We call this legislation "mandatory standard loaf legislation." The baking industry offers to you, as it has offered to successive State legislatures, the principle of the permissive standard loaf. The issue, then, simply is Shall the baking industry, in contrast to every other industry in the United Statse, be held to an arbitrary fixed, rigid standard unit in a state of manufacture, not a unit in a state of nature, a unit in the state of manufacture? Shall the baking industry be held to that, with a representation of weight, or shall the baking industry be told, as every other industry is told under the pure food and drugs act, that it shall simply make a representation of the net quantity of the contents of the commodity, in this case bread, which is sold or offered for sale in interstate commerce? I ask you to take our position at the very outset as involving a tender to this committee, which I shall crystallize in definite form before I close, of a regulation, if you see fit to make it, which shall hold the baking industry definitely to accurate and truthful representation of the quantity of the contents of any container, placing the commodity of bread on an equal plane with any of the other commodities under the pure food act. Now, I am apprising you of this at the beginning, because we are just a little solicitous of the good opinion of the public, and that includes this legislative committee, as against any innuendo that there is the slightest disposition on the part of the baking industry to withhold any information from the public, to conceal any practice which may be engaged in. Quite the contrary. We have, of course, voluminous records which are open to you should you wish to pass on the good faith of what we say, in order that you may give the proper weight to what I have said. If it be true, as I am seeking to state to this committee, that the baking industry has affirmatively sponsored legislation which would impose upon it the perfectly proper regulation requiring an accurate and truthful representation of the weight of each loaf of bread, then you can see that it does involve a rather sharp injustice to the industry when you see the press carrying headlines in terms of thievery emanating from a Member of this House of Representatives. Now, upon this issue-that is, between the standard weight loaf and the permissive weight loaf just let me give a very quick résumé of the cost of legislation. Massachusetts, in 1918, adopted a bread weight bill which we have considered ever since then furnished a very real model for legislation. The act that I am referring to I shall be very glad to leave with the clerk of the committee for incorporation, either physically or by reference, in the record of the hearing. (The Massachusetts law referred to reads as follows:) MASSACHUSETTS STATUTE RELATIVE TO THE WEIGHTS OF BREAD WITH RULES AND REGULATIONS TO BE OBSERVED IN THE MANUFACTURE AND SALE THEREOF. LEGAL WEIGHTS OF BREAD AS PRESCRIBED BY CHAPTER 94, GENERAL LAWS (AS AMENDED BY CHAPTER 186, ACTS OF 1922). SEC. 7. Except as provided in the following section, bread shall not be manufactured for sale, sold, or offered or exposed for sale otherwise than by weight, and shall be manufactured for sale, sold, or offered or exposed for sale only in units of one pound, one and one-half pounds, or multiples of one pound. When multiple loaves are baked, each unit of the loaf shall conform to the weight required by this section. The weights herein specified shall mean net weights not more than twelve hours after baking, or not more than twelve hours after the sale and delivery of such loaves by the manufacturer or by his servant or agent. Such weights shall be determined by the average weight of not less than six loaves: Provided, That such average weights shall be determined by the weight of at least twelve loaves whenever such number of loaves is available at the time and place of such weighing: And provided further, That bread found upon any premises occupied for the manufacture of bread for sale, or any bread found in the wagons, trucks, baskets, boxes, or other delivery vehicles or receptacles owned or controlled by the manufacturer of such bread, and being transported or delivered for sale, shall for the purposes of this section be deemed to have been baked within twelve hours unless such bread is marked, designated, or segregated as stale bread, under regulations prescribed by the director of standards. |