Farmers Take On the Commission Men—and Demand Weekly Checks
Yakima growers propose a $5,000 bond for produce brokers, while Sumner farmer W. H. Paulhamus recalls how organized producers stopped getting 'did' by middlemen.
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At the last meeting of the Yakima Horticultural Union, Robert Johnson suggested the passage of a law by the legislature requiring commission men to deposit $5,000 with the state treasurer as a bond to protect consignors from loss.
A law already exists in this state, passed in 1895, to regulate the sale of farm products, requiring that commission merchants take out a license and file the names of those engaged in the business, their place of business and the character of the produce business to be conducted. It prohibits any trust, combination, conspiracy or pool for the purpose of artificially raising or depressing the price of produce, or excluding from the market any particular kind of produce, or that from any section or individual. It requires a complete set of books showing the amount and character of consignments received, date of receipt, to whom sold, date of sale and price; returns must be made seven days after sale, and payment within thirty days.
The law, as it is, seems to be good enough, but what does it amount to? The proposed amendment requiring each commission merchant to put up a bond of $5,000 would shut out three-fourths of the commission men now doing business. The Ranch is informed by its attorney that it would not be constitutional, anyway.
'When I ship goods to a commission man,' said W. H. Paulhamus the other day, 'I specify that as soon as he receives same he shall notify me by postal card, and also give the quotations for that day, showing condition of the market. More, I want my check for my goods on the Saturday night following—and get it, too. If a commission firm don't want to do business my way they don't get my consignments. Several years ago, when I broke into farming down at Sumner, I found that the producers were sending in their stuff to the house that could hire the best talkers and write the best letters. I didn't know much about that sort of thing, and submitted for a time, but finally woke up to the fact that we were being 'did' by the commission men, and that we could change things to a more businesslike system if we tried. Now all the farmers down in our country, instead of consigning their produce to Tom, Dick and Harry, and getting their money once a year, receive their check at the end of the week.'
“Now all the farmers down in our country, instead of consigning their produce to Tom, Dick and Harry, and getting their money once a year, receive their check at the end of the week.”
Farmers' fight for transparent pricing and prompt payment is an early version of today's supply-chain fairness arguments. The proposed bond and the Sumner cooperative discipline show producers trying to shift power from middlemen—an enduring theme in Washington agriculture and small-business policy.
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