Now let me run on. Mr. Chairman, I want to refer briefly to this promotion plan. Whether you are going to give it any consideration, I do not know. It is a plan that has been gotten up, saying it is a selfsupporting plan and solves all the problems of the growers, the surplus problems. They spend the money to pay all the CCC losses. They spend the money to pay the shellers for low-grade peanuts to keep them out of the animal trade. They pay cooperative expenses in administering the program, and publicity promotion and so forth. For the first year the assessment can be 10 percent, 5 percent is an increase in support price and the other 5 percent by the growers. After the first year the grower makes no contribution at all. The contribution to that program and get this straight-under this act is made by the American public who buy peanut products. It is a request—and do not misunderstand this-to ask the people who buy salted peanuts, and peanut butter, and candy out yonder to pay the loss under the peanut program, to pay for the diversion of offgrade shell peanuts, to pay for publicity, for promotion, and under the Southwest bill for peanut research. Now you maybe want that, I do not know. We feel in the Southeast that for the present time at least we can go on assessing ourselves, working with the manufacturers, and see if we cannot have a substantial part in increasing the demand, increasing the acreage, and increasing income.

Now the Southwest bill, Bob, the North Carolina bill, does that on a national basis. I mean, everyone. The Southwest bill says that except for research and promotion, which will not cost over 1 percent of parity, that it shall all be done on an area basis. Now I think the attitude of the Southwest is, speaking very frankly, and I cannot serve you unless I do speak frankly, is that we have the surplus in the Southeast, and therefore we should pay all of the cost. I am going to discuss in a minute the provisions in the Southwest bill for an increase in acreage. And if they get the acreage they want, and are asking in that bill, the Southwest will become the surplus area, and I am unable to reconcile the desire of the Southwest to make two separate requests for more acres. Bob, they have a provision in here that the allotment to the Southwest-to any area, not to the Southwest, but they say they are the ones that need it-that we make an allotment to Texas for 300,000 acres, that then that they have not been planting all their acreage, that they cannot get the growers to plant it, and also you have bad weather. And they say here that you must increase the allotment to Texas, using that as an example, by enough to be sure that every one of the 300,000 acres is harvested with peanuts. Now if we are going to start that, I do not know where we will go.

They say, they were up at the hearing on this differential about a month ago, that they cannot get the growers to plant. I told them then we had written ino the law that: If I am not going to plant my peanuts, all I have to do is take them to the county committee and let them be allocated to some other grower. They told me that the growers won't do that. Well, that is a home problem. They thought they would lose an acre when they did not plant it. But, you remember, in 1949 or 1950 we froze peanut acreage allotments. Georgia would get the same allotment if we did not plant a single acre, you understand. But they have a request in here to increase their allot

Mr. SCOTT. Well, I am not an expert on legislation at all. I certainly would go along with the thinking of this committee as to when would be the proper time to bring this bill out. But we are looking forward to legislation soon to alleviate part of these unfair conditions, as we see them, in that area.

Mr. MCMILLAN. Mr. Grant, do you care to ask any questions? Mr. GRANT. No.

Mr. MCMILLAN. Thank you.

Mr. Sydney Reagan, do you care to make an additional statement today?

STATEMENT OF SYDNEY REAGAN, GENERAL COUNSEL, SOUTHWEST PEANUT SHELLERS ASSOCIATION

Mr. REAGAN. Yes, sir; I would appreciate an opportunity to make an additional statement, sir.

I am Sydney Reagan, general counsel of the Southwest Peanut Shellers Association.

I would like to take this opportunity to comment on statementsMr. MCMILLAN. Excuse me. Mr. Burleson, would you care to

reintroduce this gentleman?

Mr. BURLESON. No, sir, Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much. He is well known here.

Mr. REGAN. I wish to take this opportunity to comment on statements that were made before this committee at the hearing on May 27. These specific statements that I refer to were made by Mr. Luther Turner representing the southeast area where runner peanuts are produced.

Mr. Turner, at least on three different times in his statement, stated that the differences in the support price between runner peanuts produced in the Southeast and Spanish peanuts produced in the Southwest was only 50 cents a ton on the same grade of farmer stock peanuts.

In other words, Mr. Turner was arguing that runner peanuts produced in the Southeast had little advantage in being marketed, since they were supported at only 50 cents a ton less than Spanish peanuts produced in the Southwest.

I would like to set the record straight as to the actual advantage that Southeast runner peanuts enjoy over Southwest Spanish peanuts as a result of price support differentials.

The price support on a ton of Southeast runner peanuts is between $5 and $6 below the price support on a ton of Southwest Spanish peanuts of the identical grade-not 50 cents a ton, as testified by Mr. Turner.

The support program for last year, which is the last year for which we have the details of the support program, provided for a support of $3.06 per each 1 percent sound, mature kernels, in a ton of farmers stock runner peanuts, compared with a support of $3.14 per each 1 percent sound mature kernels in a ton of farmers stock Southwest Spanish peanuts.

Now, if we assume that a typical ton of peanuts contains 65 percent sound mature kernels, we have a difference in support price between the 2 types of peanuts of $5.20. This figure is obtained by multiplying the difference of 8 cents per each 1 percent sound mature kernels by the 65 percent of sound mature kernels in the ton of peanuts.

Now, I feel sure that Mr. Turner was misinformed about these differentials, but we do feel that it is essential that the record be set straight on this matter.

The Southwest area was delighted when Mr. Turner, representing the Southeast area, reportedly stated at the hearing on May 27 that he was willing, and apparently anxious, to wipe out the present advantages enjoyed by Southeast runners over Southwest Spanish, by having uniform support prices for the same grade of farmers stock peanuts.

I trust that the Department of Agriculture will bring about this uniformity, since the Southeast area is supporting such uniformity, and since the Department of Agriculture has, at the present time, administrative authority to bring about uniformity.

Mr. POAGE. Mr. Regan, for what reason do you believe the Department is going to do that?

Mr. REAGAN. Well, I will confess that is putting a lot of trust. But it seems to me that here you have 2 areas that heretofore have been in disagreement, and here you have a representative, a spokesman, of 1 of the areas appearing before this committee and saying, in effect, that they agree with what we have been trying to get done administratively.

Mr. POAGE. I hope you are right. But I think it is going to take legislation to get it done.

Mr. GRANT. Pardon me. Let me ask you a question. Who is Mr. Turner?

Mr. REAGAN. Mr. Turner-let us see-he is connected with the GoldKist Peanut Co. He is on the I am just trying to recall the designations he gave at the hearing. He is on the board of directors of the Southeastern Peanut Association. And he also, I believe, has a separate peanut company of his own.

Mr. GRANT. Do you know who authorized him to speak for the Southeast? You say the Department should go ahead and put it in because the representative from the Southeast has stated that should be done.

Mr. REAGAN. Well, Mr. Pace was speaking for the Southeast, speaking for both growers and shellers. And Mr. Turner was accompanying Mr. Pace. And Mr. Pace, at the hearing, as I recall, turned to Mr. Turner on a line of questioning, and turned it over to him. So I presume he was not speaking as an indivadual before this committee, but as a representative.

Mr. GRANT. Do you know who Mr. Pace represents?

Mr. REAGAN. Well, he said at this hearing that he represented the growers and the shellers in the Southeast.

Mr. GRANT. I just wanted the record to show that.

Mr. ABBITT. Then I believe Mr. Turner gave the inference that Mr. Pace was speaking for them, that they were more or less

Mr. POAGE. That Pace was working for him.

Mr. ABBITT. That Pace was working for him, and that he could more or less indicate what Mr. Pace was saying along that line. Is that not the inference?

Mr. REAGAN. That is correct. That is my recollection of the hearing. Mr. ABBITT. Here were the Southeast growers, the Southeast shellers, and here were the people from the Southwest, both the

frankly--that you are not bound by any such statement and you are not giving us any such statement of your own.

Mr. PACE. Bob, we have an executive committee that establishes policies.

Mr. POAGE. I know it.

Mr. PACE. The Virginia-North Carolina bill, please understand, has been moving around now for 22 years. It was presented to the Senate Agriculture Committee in Raleigh, in 1955. It has been before me and my executive committee 25 times. They have instructed me from time to time what their position is. I am not speaking out of the air, please understand me. I wouldn't dare to. As far as they are concerned, I have instructions as to their position. I am also speaking for the growers of Georgia, Florida, and Alabama. I met with them and they took a vote and they declared themselves. I am presenting their views, not my own. Please understand that. Don't put me in a position of saying I will agree to one thing and won't agree to another.

Mr. MCMILLAN. Let us move on.

Mr. POAGE. Mr. Chairman, this is the crux of the whole thing. There isn't anything else involved here except this question of whether we are going to get a square deal across the board and everybody is to be treated alike.

Mr. MCMILLAN. We have other witnesses that desire to testify today.

Mr. POAGE. If we are to have the same rules across the belt we can settle this thing in a moment. There is no man here, Mr. Chairman, that can give us such an authoritative statement as Mr. Pace can. Everybody knows he represents a large part of the peanut industry. Everybody knows that he has done so much for the peanut industry. I think he is outstanding, head and shoulders above everybody else, in the peanut industry, and I think he has done one of the greatest jobs for his people that I have ever seen done. I want to know where he stands. I want to know if he is going to keep insisting that my people should have less for their peanuts than the people of the Southeast. If so, I must, of course, do what I can to destroy the machinery he is using. I would much prefer to work with him. But if we have no way of getting these sections together, the best thing for us to do is to wipe out the entire peanut program and grow peanuts. We may feed them to the hogs, but we will grow peanuts.

Now, if you don't want to treat everybody alike, then let us just go back to where we don't have any special privileges. All you have asked is just a "fair advantage" for your people. Now, let us just wipe out all advantage for everybody.

Mr. MCMILLAN. Let us get on with the hearing. Mr. Pace. Mr. PACE. I am sorry, Bob. I have no authority. Mr. POAGE. I have no criticism of you personally. But I have heard all I want to know. I am deeply disappointed. I thought I had gotten somewhere. Now I find that you refuse to treat us as equals.

Mr. PACE. I love you but you don't want an idle promise. Mr. POAGE. I cannot look upon Mr. Turner's statement as an idle promise.

Mr. PACE. Mr. Chairman, I am about done. There is a peculiar thing in the Southwest bill. It is difficult to understand. They come in the first section and amend normal supply, amend total supply, to increase the support price of peanuts up to 90 percent. As you all know-I am about done as I have said, they raised the support up in the first paragraph and about the last one, as all of you know, you have got two flexible price-support schedules. You have got cotton and peanuts. Then you have another one for wheat, corn, tobacco, and what else. The supply percentage on wheat has been down to 102 percent to get 90 percent support. This percentage on cotton and peanuts can be as high as 108 percent and you still get 90 percent support. For some reason I don't understand, and it wasn't explained this morning, they have taken peanuts out of the 108 percent with cotton and they are putting it over with wheat which will have exactly the opposite effect. It will reduce this support price on peanuts.

Now, there may be some justification, but if there is, I can't think of it.

Now, the last section, Mr. Chairman, is a section that would have the effect of telling the Commodity Credit Corporation who should or should not administer the price support schedule. That may be a subject that this committee wants to go into, but I have very serious doubts about it.

Mr. Chairman, I am very grateful to you, sir. I am sorry I consumed so much of your time.

The CHAIRMAN. We certainly appreciate your taking time to give us your opinion of this pending legislation.

Any questions?

Thank you.

Mr. Turner, will you give a further statement?

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Chairman, I would appreciate the opportunity, please, sir, to help my good friend, Congressman Poage, as Mr. Abbitt, if I may, sir, to try to understand the things that you and certainly I am very deeply concerned about, Congressman Poage. I believe some of the best friends I have in the peanut industry are your constituents. We have fought this battle up one road and down the other.

The same thing goes with a lot of your constituents, Congressman Abbitt, and you have seen me at these peanut meetings over a period of 20 years, I suppose. Times and conditions change most everything, and it certainly has changed the peanut-growing habits, productionwise, tonnage per acre. Types of peanuts have been improved considerably by our esteemed gentlemen, some of Congressman Matthews' constituents, who have added to the peanut industry a type of peanut, if you please, Mr. Poage, that has brought about this thing that you and I are talking about, maybe an inequity in differentials, if you please.

The Dixie runner peanut has replaced what used to be, Mr. Abbitt and Mr. Rawling, a hog peanut. It isn't so any more. It is now an outstanding competitive product. We don't deny that, not in one degree. We are proud of it. We are glad of it, sir.

Now, getting back to these differentials-and Mr. Moake I believe is not here on the same grade, if you please, and this is going in the record, we pay within 50 cents a ton for Runner peanuts of what the