The nonpartisan leader. [volume], December 21, 1916, Image 5

About The nonpartisan leader. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1915-1921

Image provided by: State Historical Society of North Dakota

                
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OUTH ST. PAUL, Deer 18.—lie
Paul livestock- market is
not market whorg_ quality sets
the .price and where stock can be
bought and sold on its merits. It is not
a market where the shipper^, cattle .go
impartially to the highest bidder. It is
not a market whtere thebuyercan pick
his load-and deal freely with the man of
.his choice.
It is a monopolized market., It is
undej the domination of a-ring.«f specu
lators, who. have grown from mereinci
dental. traders' "coppijig" off a penny
..here and there, to a powerful clique 'of
millionaires who control the livestock.
Exchange, dictate. its rules and say who
shall and who shall not make use if the
South St. Paul livestock market. i.
Zy In a.series of articles I expect to tell
some, of the facts that shippers of live
stock ought to know, for "these facts
concern all the producers of cattle, sheep
and hogs in Mtmtana, theDakotas, Min
nesota and part of those in Iowa and
Illinois, who ship through' this, market.
It is a story^pfmingled craftiness and
bulldozing, boycott, ostracism, -loans to
stockmen, control: of supposed rivals
'.through firiandal dependence, show}'
framing of "ethical" .rules, and secret
breaking of.those same rules. These are'
isome of the details of the picture, but
^3n this first, article -only a few broad
vstrokes can.be given—enough to show
•low speculators have developed the mar
ket into a toll-paying- device of their own.
When^hrestock first began to reach
South StyPaul in 1887, there were no
speculators and there was no packing
house to utilize the stock/' The animals
begah to arrive before the plant was
completed. Arid ev£n after Swift & Co.
bad begun operation there was a large
percentage Vf stock that could not be,
V^used in -the plant. The commission men
vJISwlio received the livestock had to find.'
tfjfas buyers local utehers or farmers, who
IsptTOuld take the'nstock to the county
i&again.
Sometimes no buyers could be. found
-^Ifand the conunisiyonmen were foiled to'
purchase the stock themselves and hunt
a buyer later^or accept the alternative,
^'quit the business and adnjit that South -i
feTl/St. Paul could not become a market.
If^The trading_was unsteady for lack of a
—•constant buying element that would
absorb all arrivals.
*9*1
HANGERS-ON BECOME
AUTOCRATS OP YARD
Under these circumstances the comnus- Wt:
Bion men gladly welcomed those 'pioneers
Who caxnetOTnarkert. The newcomer^-
the business increased.
Once mere huigers-oii'around tlte out
side theM speculators -are today the
autocrats of tiie yards. In the last 15
years or more they have increased in
numbers, and bjr a gradual crystallization
an "old guard" haa been definitely.
Old timers yartfe-lsaiy, it is a matter'
good.
formed, and it is blindness -and self con- ?™ler'80 Adams could not go els^
sdoumess of power tiiat has, at last ...
brought abont a disclosure of methods, "Wait-nntd after dinner" he said,
and
caused indignation' and N^istrust "one of the tradert here the yard
northwestern stock raisers and wants rty whole string, and you can buy*
shinnas. .Jlw** what you want-at only a sinall
When Bates and "Sarsfield of NeVad^^^JJ?6®-'' ~r- 7
IoWa,'-sat on tte fieiice and saw a carload
chance, by first selling to the speculators
and then compelling the "outsider" to
buy of them. Once in a great while a
commission man will sell directly to an
outside fyiyer, but in 59 cases.out of 100
it^S the "insider," the yard speculator,
who gets the stuff.
INDIVIDUAL CASES'SHOW
HOW FARMERS LOSE CASH-
at
speculators they Wfe, who saw a yawn
ing opportunity and leaped at it—gave j„- B* Adams of Braddo^c,
stability to the~ market because of the -^was on the South St. Paul
always certain outlet 'they afforded, arid recently to fany several carloads of feeder
niea®^
of feeder cattle gold Jor S©^nts per 100, promote pet head for Mr. Adams to.|»y,
pounds less thiffl they.themselves offered,.- it meant a conuqissicm for
they knew sfrmrthin*^ -wrong." This
i» only orte:$f:W sirtfilat instancwef.^ «eT
of d&ily occurrence, kwe 'Were buyers, A certaitt Mr. De^k^px. *tosby, N. D.,
willing Cto-pay a gopd price for some had aix head of cattle mxa carload a
farmer's cattle, but theif money was nft short time ago and saw them sold to a
How do^s thjs happen?^ Through & ^£9
"commercial" usage -(a "gentleman's fo1, the lot.
By Ralph Harmon,. Staff Correspondent of the Nonpartisan Leader
After, the speculator haft-bought the
stock he slaps on a spread of $1 to
several dollars per head and resells it.
Sometimes this stock is sold without
another feefding, and all .of the spread is
speculator's profit.' Sometimes the stock
Is sorted and-fed a day or two and the
speculator makes a still larger profit., to sell..
Sometimes'he doesn't-rbut the old-timer^. "No. You go to the speculator,'
of
£em
f«wn^ne million to, three
cattle. He had placed bis. order with 'a
certain-commission firm but did not want
to pay an added toll to any yard .trader.
The commission man -had just received
on commission that day the^kind of stock
he wanted, but .refused to sell them to
him—-«tcept just a few head to'hold- his
not only an advshce
60
speculator at 50. cents per
The ethei! side of this -deal '-is' tSe ^less than his commission man-was offered
ioma At.,#!.-'*
.hefeds—
tea
tot-
%1Q0
pounds
S'iK'SS
4
Jn addition to paying the commission.
He was just as much at the mercy of "the
commission map. and ^speculator as
though he had been arbitrarily assessed
a commission-of 54.5b per head instead of
50' cents.
"SPECULATOR'S ALLEY"
DOES A BIG BUSINESS -V
Another man who wanted to buy a
whole car of cattle from a commission
man who had them on consignment, was
fi. Richricks of Dickinson, ,N. D. He was
willing to pay a good price, which would
hav^- yielded1 the ..shipper more money
than the speculator, paid the commission
mai^ but the latter absolutely refused
mi
«!The Sooth. St. Paul stockyards. In the foreground is a drove of "feeder" cattle in .a. speculator's pen. The stockyards are
dominated by a gronp of speculators, who boy upstoCkandresell it to formers who want to fatten animals., for market. A
farmer with stock to sell can sddom if evei^get touch-with a farmer wanting tp buy feeders," evpn through
man. Both the speculator and commission man stand between the farmer who is a buyer and the farmer irho is a seller.
said. That- meant an advance of any
sum up to a dollar/or two per headj ioi*
tiie buyer to pay, but it meant^no bigger
the
Thus it is Wat the speculators have
become,the dominant factor at the South
iSt Paul stockyards and have succeeded
in draining into* their own^pens the wealth
of the livestock industry. And half the
business df the yards is done in the
"speculator's alley," or what- in. more
dignified langruage is called the "Feeder
Official: figures for. 1915 "show thl^t out
~vof 797,833 head of cattle sold on the
markei «mly 842$S31 were used at-South
St. Paul, while. 411^78 were sold out to
"feeclers"—that is-tp farmers or ranch-N.
iflnieri who bought^ them for-fattening, and
resale to some packing house at" some
.. future time. Of-sheep 160,000 hedd were
sold~to ^feedfrs" and 189,000 were, killed
at. the South St. Paul packing housed.
l%us ir»wJH be seen how large is thev
field of operation, for the- speculators—:
approximately half of tiie ^tire busi
neBs outside ef ^ogs. The hogs are
nearly, a&ldlled a day pr two after beipg
received and do .not fall into. H)'
of the yaid traders.
i8"'
or
agreement" as ttie big railroad magnates f- Commission for selling is the same as traders. Their i^imes^aQd much of thei^M1110^141, bunch of cattie. -They are owned
««.
feller's Sunday school class would lis
quoted about Standard Oil doingft
There is a reason.
SOW THE MILLIONAIRE
TRADERS GET BUSINESS
But to illustrate, suppose we sa%
.using fictitious names, that Isaacs an4
Thpmpson are the king pins of the yi
They are speculators rated at a millii
or so each, Bhrewd cattle buyers am
business men. They, belong to th«:
Exchange and are very, "dose" to tw4
or three commission houses that thro*
the bulk of their consignments to Isaacf'
and Thompson..
One of these commission houses gets
a carload of cattle that the Iowa, Mon«
tana or Illinois feeders are daffy over*
0
The house sends for the I. ft T. buyer to
look at them. He makes Mi offer, whicb
no one hears for the talk is off in ft
corner of the pen or alley, and Isaacs 4c
Thompson get. the toad. Other buyers
may be ready to offer more—may actually
they must raise the bid at
least 10 cents per 109 (for traders wffl
not "split a dime") arid even if ^hey dp
offer' more they may not get it as the
cases of Bates arid Sarsfield and others
show." The shipper loses and the speco* s®3
lators win.
Now consider the case from the
countryman's point of view—the man f||
«rho, comes to buy battle to feed, Jones
of Soiuth Dakota, we. will sajr "The- con^ i&i
mission man takes his customer to Isaacs
& Thompson and shows their string of-«5p
cattie. If Jones does nof care for them,
he takes Jones down the yards a block
or two and introduces him to the cattl«
of the Crown Cattle company. Now
Isaacs & Thompstn fejwe set tlie Crown
Cattle company up in iwaines^ They
went on their bonds, toit tiiein the money
to buy a seat on itiie .Exdainge and lent»
them other' suih8 ,at "critical periods.
Isaacs & -Thompsim: owttol the Crown
LKB^EE^V.,ad,
„ExAange. They are knoy?n as "the old But/if Jones thinks he can do better
..s guard" wxd" embrace «mi^.oi,the pioneer :««wn^rI»ere- else he^^Js ciuualty pointed to
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