Routine Vigilance

P: Tired Business Men who twirled their radio dials one night last week picked up the voice of Assistant Attorney General Thurman Arnold as he pleaded for a larger trust-busting corps--one comparable with SEC's 1,200 or Civil Aeronautics Authority's 2,800. He now has a staff of 65. Said he: "You can't police a country as large as America with a corporal's guard." Meanwhile, as such outbursts spurred vacationless lawyers ransacking files for anything that the Congressional Monopoly Investigation committee might conceivably regard as incriminating evidence, the dogged Federal Trade Commission continued unheralded its 24-year-old pursuit of anti-trust law violators and unfair trade practicers.

In the five years since Franklin Roosevelt began his vigil over business morals, FTC has disposed of twice as many com plaints as in the previous five years--and the commission has been rewarded for its vigilance: 1) the 1936 Robinson-Patman Act extended its jurisdiction over price discrimination; 2) the 1938 Wheeler-Lea amendment to the original Federal Trade Commission Act relieved it of the necessity of proving that unfair trade practices injured competitors and allowed the commission to go to court to obtain remedies; 3) this year the Government provided the commission with a new home.

Last week, by way of routine, the commission quietly filed nine complaints, issued seven cease-&-desist orders, and obtained stipulations from 13 firms which voluntarily agreed to the commission's reform proposals. Last week samples of the commission's multiplied activities:

R. H. Macy, James McCutcheon and James McCreery, Manhattan department stores, agreed to stop advertising as "silk" products which were not. Colt Shoes, Boston, promised to qualify the statement that Colt shoes are hand-lasted and keep feet healthy. Letellier-Phillips Paper Co. of New Orleans, the South's wastepaper dictator whose small competitors tattled, was ordered to cease and desist from maintaining a monopoly by intimidation and boycott of competitors.

Last week the U. S. Government also did the following for and to U. S. Business : CL Approved a reorganization plan for the Chicago Great Western Railroad Co. (see p. 43).

P: Worried about cotton and wheat surpluses, announced next year's crop-control program (see below).

P: Furnished an object lesson to the cotton industry. AAA ordered bagging for 1,000,000 bales of cotton to be 'made of domestic cotton rather than imported jute --at no greater cost. Said AAA: If cotton bagging was used exclusively, 135,000 bales would be consumed yearly.

P: Set minimum motortruck freight rates for the New England and Central States. To stop destructive rate wars in the industry, ICC established a new "floor," averaging 1 1/2% higher in New England and 3 1/2% higher in the Central district than rates now in effect.

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