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Show COMPETITION PREVENTED Companies Have Oral "Understandings" to Maintain Rates. Washington, Jan MOral under-Standing under-Standing to maintain rates between I the Iimport and Holt line the Hous-ton Hous-ton line at the Prince line, the Barbour Bar-bour and the Wet weir lines, carrying commerce between New York and La Plats .Montevideo, has existed since januan 1912, according to testimc iy of Paul C. Gerhart, New York agent ff the Prince line, testifying today before the house committee on merchant mer-chant marine. He further testified thai he had understandings with other lines running run-ning from New York to South Amer-jlcn. Amer-jlcn. In the La Plata trade he declared, de-clared, there were qq rebates and no division or territory. "The 1 Plata I line was where we were permitted to , make rates on certain articles. Now thej are made In London, however" ' When was that change made0" asked Representative Humphrey. "I should say about two years ago " London Offices Control Sh:pping. Speaking of the South African trade the witness said he believed there was no pooling, but he had no doubt that the London offices saw to it that each line got its proportion of the trade regulating the. trips of the respective seamers. Mr. tJerhart testified thai with the four or five largest New York exporters ex-porters to the Plata, special contracts were made by the lines ami smaller explorers then given the same rates Represenlulive Alexander suggested this prevented competition in rates. Rate Cutting Unfortunate ' Rate cutting is a most unfortunate position to be In," replied Mr. Oer-hart. Oer-hart. "You can t run steamers unless on a paving basis You can't do it on a paying basis except vou have an i nnderstandins acamst cuttinc rates. We have had some bitter experiences." experi-ences." Trust Controls New York Trade. William L. Halm. New York accnt for the Prince line, testified that a "trust" controlled .New York trade to South Africa. 1 may say that I know the freights aie pooled' he testified. Subject to that conference were the Houston line the Prince line, the I Hansan line, the Clay line and t e I Han-A-frtcnns line He declared not i a shipper was dissatisfied with the j South African service His line had a special contract with the Standard Oil company, agreed iion in London land duplicated to the Xew York Lu-I Lu-I b Treating company Chairman Alexander asked whether ! the Houston line was in any agreement agree-ment regulating freight or passenger traffic between the house and the Plata Rates tor this trade, the wit- ness said, w ere made in New York i at conferences between representatives representa-tives of the various steamship lines, although no written agreements were entered into. The conferences, he said, were held once a week on the i floor of the stock exchange or wherever wher-ever the representatives happened to get together In fixing rates, the witness wit-ness added, an effort was made to ' keep them on a paritv with rates from Germany and England Mr Halm declared that his company com-pany had not given rebates on outgoing out-going cargoes for many years. Rebates on Cargoes "1 know nothing about rebates on 'cargoes from Argentina to the T'nit-ed T'nit-ed States, " said the witness, "but I know from correspondence that rebate re-bate arrangements exist." Representative Humphreys wanted to know whether there were any agreements between railroads and Steamship companies as to through! races Mr Halm said that as far as he knew no such agreements ever were entered Into Asked if any lines n the South American trade did not participate in the rate conferences, the witness named the Norton line. |