For nearly two months in the House cloakrooms and corridors, the word had been quietly circulated: 90% is worth $1.25. What it meant was that if Northern big-city Democrats would vote for rigid 90% parity farm supports, then the Democrats of the agricultural South would look kindly on labor demands for a $1.25 minimum wage law. The groundwork for the vote trade had been carefully laid, e.g., some 57,000 copies of pro-90% statements by C.I.O. President Walter Reuther and A.F.L. Leader George Meany had been sent out under the franks of Democratic members...
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