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Show MM MBT ' Hoover Holds Certain Whole- sale and Retail Dealers Re-j Re-j sponsible for Shortages. INQUIRY TO START Typical Cases Recited of Greed of Men Speculating in Necessaries of Life. WASHINGTON. Dec. 11. Charges by Pood Administrator Hoover that some dishonest wholesale and retail merchants and food brokers have been criminally responsible for food shortages short-ages and rising prices were taken under investigation today by the federal fed-eral trade commission. Victor Murdock will be in charge of the inquiry which "will be prose -' cuted with vigor and with all of the, trade commission's broad investigative investiga-tive powers behind It." Speculation in foods was declared , today in a statement by Commissioner, Murdock to hayo far-reaching results' I In causing unrest. Unprincipled brokers and dealers are said to order goods beyond their requirements on a rising market, believing they can . make money if prices continue to go! up, and can at least prevent loss by rejecting the shipment. Typical Cases of Graft. A typical case was cited of a man 1 in Indiana ordering a carload of perishables, per-ishables, say potatoes, from a Minnesota Minne-sota grower. By the time delivery is made prices have dropped and rejection rejec-tion of the car is made on a flimsy pretext. While a settlement is being j effected the potatoes are out of the market, transportation is delayed byl failure to unload and sometimes the' food deteriorates. I 1 Will Be Prosecuted to Limit, j "I am going to prosecute this investigation in-vestigation to the limit and bring any violators to the sternest payment of justice," said Commissioner Murdock. "It is hard to find words to describe profiteers who are doing business along such lines at this time when so many men arc giving up their lives for their country. Such pernicious business practices wnich net the men who follow them a little extra blood money must be stamped out at the start and kept stamped out. I am going to give my entire time to this Job if it is necessary to get results and put somo of these unpatriotic I 'camp followers' and 'war leeches' behind be-hind bars, where they rightly belong. So- far as I am concerned I do not think profiteering of this character can be bettered by use of a feather duster; it requires a club. "In this investigation I would like every citizen to consider himself spe-,: cifically delegated by me to furnish,' my information which might bo help-ul help-ul in running down the type of food! profiteerers we are after. ! nn I |