SLOWING DOWN

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 104, 30 October 1933, Page 9

SLOWING DOWN

BUSINESS IN AMERICA

RESERVE BANK AND N.R.A.

IMMEDIATE PROTEST

United Tress Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright. WASHINGTON, October 27. A sharp difference of opinion over the interpretation of the results of the national recovery programme developed within the administration today, when the Federal Reserve Bank Board issued its monthly statement declaring that business activity had slowed down in the past two months in industries "in which agricultural processing taxes or National Eecovery Act codca have become effective recently." The Administrator of the National Eecovery Act (General Hugh Johnson) and the Secretary for Agriculture (Mr. Henry Wallace) immediately issued strong protests. General Johnsou insisted that "every report received from major industries, excepting steel, shows a definite upward trend." The Secretary of Agriculture insisted that' the apparent slowing down in industries and the processing of farm products were due to their efforts to V anticipate the processing levies, thereby boating the tax." Some political observers here interpret the Reserve Bank Board statement as the first open break in the longstanding rift between the fiscal branch of the Government and the National Eecovery administration. STIMULATING STEEL. President Roosevelt's plan to stimulate the steel industry has again been brought forward, as the President •charged four leading steel corporations with 'collusion in bidding for contracts. For years, through an extra-legal agreement, the price q£ rails has been pegged at 40 dollars a ton. President Roosevelt indicated that the companies should bid individually, and at a lower rate in order to get the Government's contemplated order of a million tons. Today the corporations presented a uni/form bid of 37 dollars 75 cents a ton. The Government has issued a virtual ultimatum that either the bids be reduced to 35 dollars or tho companies' books be opened for Government inspection, after which President Eoosevelt would fix a fair price. Tho Public Works administration announced that 200,000,000 dollars will be allocated to a new Government corporation, which will engage directly in the construction of model homes and tenements in congested city areas. FORD AND THE BOYCOTT. President Eoosevelt definitely projected a boycott against Mr. Henry Ford today when he let it be known that, barring a legal decision by the Attorney-General to the contrary, Mr. Ford is ineligible to receive Government contracts. Mr. Ickes, Secretary of the Department of tho Interior, which is perhaps the largest Government purchaser of equipment, definitely announced that no more Ford vehicles would be purchased, and General Hugh Johnson agfcin made a threat of legal action against -Mr. Ford, saying that any "clear-cut violation" of the code by Mr. Ford would be communicated to the Department of Justice as a personal gesture against Mr. Ford.