Woodrow Wilson to John F. Fort

You may be sure that I am not in the least inclined to criticize the part you played in the conferences which led to a tentative agreement about the price of coal, but I do think that it was unfortunate that the conference attempted to deal with the matter of prices at all, simply because it is open to so much misconstruction when men, like the operators in this instance, seem to take the initiative in determining what price they shall themselves receive and then arrive at a conclusion which exactly coincides with the agreement which certain operators are now under indictment by the Government for making “in restraint of trade.” I think that if the conference could have been confined to the objects stated in the first part of one of the resolutions I read, namely, to the means which would most tend to increase production and facilitate distribution of the product, it would have been wholly admirable. Whenever such conferences go beyond that and deal with matters of price, they open themselves to public misconstruction.
I feel confident that as a result of the costs to be ascertained by the Federal Trade Commission some government agency can itself arrive at a conclusion with regard to price and a liberal profit which will seem to the country satisfactory and conclusive.Woodrow WilsonHon. John Franklin Fort,Federal Trade Commission.