AMERICAN MEAT TRUST.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 15055, 26 July 1912, Page 11

AMERICAN MEAT TRUST.

PROTEST BY HOUSEWIVES. J "''-tncmOTOOwicOBJIESPOSOKSX.] ■r: New Yoek 4 Juno 24. •a.cobdin-g to report* from various cities A Kastcni States, housewives aro ■ -: I" 1 ST themselves together with the ob--"-S S securing a reduction in the price ' V _♦ In Williamsburg. 1 one of the ' °hS of Now York, chiefly inhabited If t foreign clement, open-air demonJ ' !;„„, have been held, and some of tho 13£%-« «*«?; dosed ft ■ : , . Tho Uousowivcs' League protects S the prices of meat are artificially * • , 111 bv the,trusts, which have Surged, has the American people by the ' , tb The master butchers declare that they ,' J powerless, and any that the problem 2b bo easily solved by abolishing tho tariff charges on food animal? which the 4ut_ American countries are eager to export. It is understood that tho present tariff amounts to a penny a lb, ami enables the Meat Trust in the United States to ' _ke its own tonus with the producers, rUftilera. and the public. The butchers Uselvcs urge the removal of the tariff, ' an d it is believed that the temper of the American people will insist °" the Government enacting legislation on their behalf. The price of the best meat over h«M is only a trifle more than that of th ° ' best meat in England, but in view of the tremendous resources of the* United States for raising meat, it is urged that the price should be considerably less. The master butchers allege that the Meat Trust limits the amount of fresh meat on the market at any one time, : that it has increased the price of fresh meat prevented competition in tho purchase and transportation of cattle and frwh meat, fixed standard prices to the nublic or consumer, carried out contracts net to sell meat below a fixed price, and, finally* that the prices are extortionate. In, Williamsburg to-day the housewives paraded the streets and attacked the Buyers of meat. They suggest ■ that all neople should protest by giving up meat during the summer and living on vegetables Peoole who tried that experiment tout tear say that they not only improved their finances, but their health as well. Vegetables in the Eastern States are not dirt cheap, the cost of a lettuce, for example, ranaing to-day from 5d to Is. People devoted to beans, which are very fashionable in the dietary of Boston, the centre of American culture, can live ;! cheaply enough, because beans in the big , American cities are cheap, and are now J' selling in enormous quantities. The 'K favourite dish of the American workman to-da" is pork and beans. |'* Notwithstanding the outcry against the 'i i high cost of living and the price of meat, the statement which Mr. Bryce, the British ';' • Ambassador, made a good many years ago that the American people of the industrial class arc the best-fed people~in any civi- , jised country, still remains largely true.