Plenary Session Transcripts

Governors Attending:

Guests:

Discussion Subjects:

Post-war problems; expansion of the National Guard system; state budgets; and growth and consolidation of administrative boards

Points of Interest:

A committee of Governors was appointed to confer with the President on how states could cooperate with the federal government in addressing the problem of the high cost of living. The chairman of that newly-appointed committee organized a conference of seven affected Governors to discuss the crisis brought on by a nationwide strike of coal miners, which led to an instruction for the Secretary of the Governors' Conference to discuss the issue with federal authorities.

Although Governors placed blame for high living costs on a variety of factors (including labor-management disputes that might be inhibiting production), they focused attention on profiteering in foodstuffs [i.e., hoarding]. But outrage about it was balanced by the cautionary advice of at least one Governor who pointed out that what might be mistaken for hoarding could actually be an effort to ensure that foodstuffs were released at a pace designed to maintain stable pricing for everyone's benefit.

Governors also discussed the concept of state budgets, and different Governors made presentations on how the preparation and presentation of budgets worked in their own states. There was very brief reference to prohibition.

Memorable Quotes:

Governor Lynn J. Frazier of North Dakota said, with respect to profiteering in foodstuffs: "...there is nothing more harmful, nothing more criminal, than...making the families of working people go hungry because they are unable to pay the high and unnecessary prices demanded for the bare necessities of life...In my opinion, state ownership, state control, and government control of the larger utilities will work for the benefit of the common people."

Concerned that the use of liquor left many parents neglectful of their children, Governor Simon Bamberger of Utah said; "There is no doubt in my mind that prohibition is going to help us all materially and is going to be of the greatest possible benefit throughout the whole of the United States and will have the effect of having the children all well educated."