Prices are now increasing by leaps and bounds. 1

Prices are now increasing by leaps and bounds. 1 do not think increased prices are justified. I read in a New York newspaper that it was said iwe were buying 1,00Q tons of sugar from the Philippines for delivery in August and September, and paying 6 cents a pound for it. Evtryone knows there is plenty of sugar. Everyone knows that Cuba has a million tons of surplus sugar which, tip t© this point, she has not known what to do with. Either such statements are merely false propaganda to start as run by housewives to get sugar or else, the 1,000 tons of sugar are being purchased in ordcrr to raise the price of the other thousands of tons which are already here, and which are owned in Cuba, to be unloaded at an unconscionable price.

I note that the steel companies, with no increase in the cost of steel, were operating at full capacity, with full employment. I saw where the manufacturers had advanced the price of stainless steel, which is in sharp demand, thua taking advantage of this situation to gouge the public. I read that cotton advanced $10 a bale in one day, although the crop reporta show that the coming cotton crop will be more than can be used domestically. Certainly we have a big surplus which the government owns. I read that the price of hogs went up in Chicago $1 a hundred in one day, although but a few; days before, the crop report showed a great increase in the prospective corn crop, and there has been a great increase in the number of hogs moved to market, farmers taking advantage of the war psychology.

Mr. President, I am on the Senate committee which must coni aider another OPA if it comes. I am on the committee which must consider allocations of scarce materials, if it comes. I am on the committee which must consider all questions affecting war controls, if the Congress is forced by tha greed and selfishness of producers and distributors, because of war psychology, to impose controls for the protection of the consuming public, and to put our economy in a straight-jacket. Nothing could please the Kremlin more than that. We do not get maximum production under government control— we never have, and we never will. But if prices are pushel up and up and up, Congress may be forced to impose controls, and the men in the Kremlin will smile, because they know that our production will be reduced, that our inflation willbeincreased, and they will then lift the war cloud and say, “Well, let us have some peace; we really were not interested in Korea, anyway; that was the fight of the North Koreans and we did nob have anything to do with it." W© shall then be' plunged into the worst depression we ever saw, and will play right into the hands of the Kremlin.

I beg the American people not to be stampeded by the threat of war. I beg the manufacturers of this country not to be selfish. They have had the best dividends, in spite of high taxation, they have ever had. They are looking forward now to full employment.