DEAR MEAT.

Evening Star, Issue 25926, 18 October 1946, Page 6

DEAR MEAT.

To some meat-hungry Americans, 'pork chops at more ( than six shillings a pound may be better, than no chops at all, but the charge seems fantastic to New Zealand housewives. By releasing meat from price control President Truman took the final step in an extraordinary series of events that have marked the gradual abandonment of price restrictions. In, the land' of opportunity, as the United States is still termed, price control has been obnoxious to producers, and the politicians have been heedful of the clamour for its abandonment. Congress showed reluctance a few months ago to extend it for another year, and as a result of the passage of an unacceptable Act, which the President vetoed; there was a period of a few weeks, of chaotic free marketing before a stop-gap measure restored control in a modified form. The brief experience of the absence of control tasted so well to the meat producers that they subsequently withheld their stock from the markets, and the Americans have been almost meatless until this week.

The ready ear which President Truman lends to the political situation robs him of much -of the stature of his predecessor in office, and must affect the respect of the nation for its chief executive. In this election year there is a widespread fear among the Democrats that the Republicans may make progress at the polls—a trend that is' not unusual in the elections held in the middle year of a president’s term of _ office. In tlip last fourteen years it was the personal prestige of Franklin Roosevelt that ensured' the Democrats a majority in presidential election years, while the Republicans made some. gains in the Congressional elections in the middle of the presidential term. Mr Truman’s reactions to recent incidents, such as the Negro question and price controls, have been clearly dictated by political considerations. Whether the appeasement of the producers by releasing meat and some other comuifoditics from price restrictions will have the . desired effect is questionable. It might be thought that the approval of the farmers has

been bought at the cost of the mass of the city dwellers, who may be expected to resent the high prices now; being charged for foodstuffs. The alternative apparently was acute shortages, and consequently the President may justify his action on the ground that price control was depriving the people of badly-needed food.; New Zealanders will probably conclude that the food and price situation has been much better handled in British countries during and since the war. The abandonment of rationing in the United States immediately after the end of the war was clearly premature, and created some resentment in starving Europe, but the American people have not fared any better as a result. The recent example in the United States is a sharp warning to other countries that in unsettled post-war conditions controls cannot be easily abandoned.