Rakestraw v. Winchester

254 F. Supp. 729, 1966 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7664
CourtDistrict Court, M.D. North Carolina
DecidedMay 16, 1966
DocketNo. C-132-G-65
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 254 F. Supp. 729 (Rakestraw v. Winchester) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, M.D. North Carolina primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Rakestraw v. Winchester, 254 F. Supp. 729, 1966 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7664 (M.D.N.C. 1966).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OPINION

EUGENE A. GORDON, District Judge.

Under the provisions of 7 U.S.C.A. § 1365 and § 1366, the plaintiffs instituted this action to obtain judicial review of the decision of the Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service (hereinafter referred to as “ASCS”) Review Committee for Rockingham County (hereinafter referred to as the “Review Committee”). The Review Committee is established under the provisions of 7 U.S.C.A. § 1363. The plaintiffs seek a reversal of the decision of the Review Committee regarding the 1965 flue-cured tobacco marketing quota for their farm.

■The facts are not in dispute. In November, 1964, the plaintiffs acquired an option on a 285 acre tobacco farm in Simpsonville Township, Rockingham County, North Carolina, which farm is identified as farm No. J757, the purchase price of the farm being $75,000.00.

At the time of the acquisition of the option, the farm had a tobacco acreage of something in excess of eleven acres. [730]*730A new referendum on the proposed reduction of tobacco acreage was imminent and the plaintiffs awaited resolution of this question before taking action on the option. In due course, the tobacco farmers approved the reduction of tobacco acreage by 19.5 per cent, thus leaving the plaintiffs’ farm in question with a tobacco allotment of 10.69 acres. The value of the farm with its adjusted acreage and before the tobacco poundage allocation, as amply supported by testimony by members of the community before the Review Committee, was $75,000.00. Thereupon, the plaintiffs in mid-December, 1964, exercised their option. The plaintiffs were of the opinion that the farm would produce 2,500 to 3,000 pounds of tobacco per acre.

Subsequent to their purchase of the farm, proposed legislation was introduced in the Congress which was ultimately to become the present poundage marketing control program. At this point plaintiffs, after studying the proposed legislation, saw disaster looming on their economic horizon. This danger was occasioned by the combination of the anticipated operation of the proposed legislation and the peculiar history of tobacco production appertaining to their newly acquired farm.

When the proposed legislation, ultimately to become P.L. 89-12, was reported to the House of Representatives by its Committee on Agriculture, the Committee noted, with some prescience, considering the present litigation, that:

“ * * * it was certain that the writing of a simple and equitable bill would be difficult * * * the bill in its present form is far from simple.” House Rep. No. 147 (Committee on Agriculture) 89th Cong. 1st Sess, U.S.Code Congressional and Administrative News, p. 1506.

Simplicity was never achieved on the balance of its legislative journey. The method by which the marketing quota for a farm producing flue-cured tobacco is determined is set out in Simpson v. Laprade et al., 248 F.Supp. 399, 400-401 (W.D.Va.1965):

“The first step is the determination of a ‘preliminary farm yield’ which approximates the average yield per acre for the farm for a five year period. The number of pounds of flue-cured tobacco produced each year for the period of 1959 through 1963 is divided by the total acreage of tobacco harvested from the farm for each year respectively. Having obtained the yield per acre for each of these five years, the three highest years are selected and a simple average of these three years is taken. The ‘farm yield’ is next ascertained by multiplying the preliminary farm yield by the national yield factor of .9349. Then the farm marketing quota is simply the farm yield times the acreage allotment.”

The “national yield factor” referred to supra, is itself somewhat complex. It is sufficient to state that it is intended to be a modifying factor applied to the “farm yield” which will bring tobacco production within limits of usability both domestic and foreign plus the establishment and maintenance of the desired reserve. 7 U.S.C.A. § 1314c(a). The bill was indeed what its opponents termed “supply management with a vengeance.” Ill Cong.Rec. 5653 (March 23, 1965) (Remarks of Rep. Anderson of 111.)

It becomes readily apparent that the production controls of the legislation providing for the marketing quota for any given farm (except as modified by certain other factors not here important) were firmly tied to the farm’s historical production of tobacco. The undisputed evidence considered twice by the Review Committee was that the prior owner of the plaintiffs’ farm was unable to exercise personal supervision of the farming operations thereon and that his manager was an unskillful agriculturist who, considering the quality of the land and making due allowance for the usual vagaries of weather and other uncertainties did not achieve the tobacco production from his acres which he should reasonably have been expected to have obtained for the past half-decade. The plaintiffs thus determined that under the proposed leg[731]*731islation, because of the prior, improper cultivation of the land, the historical production of the farm would, of necessity, prohibit their marketing the anticipated 2,5Q0 to 3,000 pounds of tobacco per acre. There was undisputed testimony by tobacco farmers in the plaintiffs’ community in the rehearing before the Review Committee to the effect that the production controls diminished the value of the plaintiffs’ farm by some 320,000.00.

The plaintiffs did not sit and nurse their grievances but telephoned and subsequently had correspondence with the Honorable B. Everett Jordan, United States Senator from North Carolina. They indicated the position in which the legislation, if passed, would place them. At the time, the Senate Committee on Agriculture & Forestry had before it S. 821, the Senate version of what was ultimately to become P.L. 89-12.

Senator Jordan referred a letter received from Mr. David Rakestraw to the Department of Agriculture for a review of the data therein contained and requested the suggestions of the Department as to how S. 821 could be amended to more adequately meet the needs of producers of tobacco. This letter of Senator Jordan to the Department of Agriculture is not contained in the record but is referred to in other correspondence.

In reply to Senator Jordan, Mr. H. D. Godfrey, Administrator of the Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service, wrote the Senator on March 15, 1965, stating:

"We have long recognized that any formula that might be used in establishing individual farm yields for the 198,000 farms which have flue-cured tobacco allotments could not be equally satisfactory to all farms. We are convinced, however, that farm yields must reflect each farm’s historical production, but that some adjustments will be necessary in order to establish farm yields that will be fair and equitable.
"The reserve authorized in Subsection (e) of S. 821 for correcting errors and establishing allotments for 'new' farms could be expanded to authorize its use for adjusting inequities.” ******
“We believe the changes suggested above will give some relief to the problems raised by Mr. Rakestraw.” (Ex. 1, on Rehearing before Review Board.)
(Emphasis supplied.)

The “reserve” referred to in the Administrator’s letter is that provided in 7 U.S.C.A.

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254 F. Supp. 729, 1966 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 7664, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/rakestraw-v-winchester-ncmd-1966.