A few years after World War I ended, Washington was still dealing with the financial aftermath of wartime price gouging.
During the war, food profiteers had been prosecuted and fined for taking advantage of shortages and inflated prices. But in 1922, one West Virginia senator proposed something unexpected: give the money back.
Senator Davis Elkins introduced a bill that would refund more than $121,000 to over a hundred people convicted of wartime food profiteering.
Elkins Would Return Money to Profiteers
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Let’s give every convicted wartime food profiteer his money back.
That’s what Senator Elkins (R) of West Virginia wants to do.
Under the Elkins Senate Bill 3193, no profiteer would escape — getting his money back.
The bill, if passed, will cost the Government a total of $121,885.85 in refunds to more than a hundred wartime profiteers, according to figures submitted the committee by the Department of Justice.
Source: The Indianapolis Times. Indianapolis, Ind. June 26, 1922.
