Word: merchantable
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...furor about Senator Joe McCarthy's "blockade by subpoena," there was a rapid changing of tunes last week. Originally, the Wisconsin Senator boldly announced that he had succeeded where the State Department had failed: his investigating subcommittee had "negotiated" an agreement with Greek shipowners to prevent 242 merchant vessels from carrying cargoes to Communist ports. In answer, Mutual Security Director Harold Stassen boldly told McCarthy that he was "undermining" the State Department. Then the rewriting began...
...workers, galled by remorseless price rises, were in a rebellious mood. On Rio's waterfront, dockers by the droves left the government-controlled union, went over to a militant new independent outfit; they refused to do any overtime work until the government started paying bonuses promised last December. Merchant marine officers threatened a strike that would tie up the government's two shipping lines. Even doctors at government institutions in Rio staged a one-day strike. Things were at their worst in São Paulo, where almost a tenth of the city's population...
...chuckles and flourishes, McCarthy announced that his Senate investigating subcommitee had just negotiated an agreement with the Greek owners of 242 merchant ships. The shipowners, said Joe, promised that their ships would no longer carry any cargoes to China and other Communist ports in the Far East. He thought the agreement would "have some of the effect of a naval blockade." Because of the "extremely delicate" nature of the agreement, McCarthy explained, his staff had negotiated with the Greeks in secret, not even informing the Secretary of State or the President, who normally have the responsibility for such agreements...
Wisconsin's junior Senator got into the blockade business by a roundabout way. His subcommittee is investigating the use of surplus U.S. merchant ships turned over to other countries. The State Department, according to McCarthy, had tried and failed to get agreements stopping shipments to Red China. Said McCarthy: "No one had ever contacted the owners of the ships before. Negotiations had always been with the Greek government...
...through standardized methods of operation, efficient management, scientific location, and the advantages gained through quantitative buying, the chains have taken almost half the total sales volume away from the independents. But the necessity for standardization in the chain store will prevent it from ever eliminating the small merchant with his personal contacts with the customers...