DEULASSEU Authority Stateletter Inhez. Cate 24181 AIR MAIL issue in the past few weeks. Trading on this fact, elements of the Right have advanced the thesis that it is impossible for agriculturists to produce the necessary quantities of foodstuffs because of the burdensome stipulations of the Labor Code which make them afraid of employing agricultural labor on any large scale. Regardless of the truth of this theory (and the Embassy is somewhat skeptical of its validity, for it has yet to be proven that, with the exception of dismissal pay, the Codigo has greatly increased the general cost of production) many producers have rallied around the argument with enthusiasm. As an opening shot in their campaign to jettison the Labor Code a group of prominent Costa Ricans called on the President on the night of November 23 and called to his attention what they considered the peril to the country of the Labor Code. According to a member of the group, the President was receptive to their arguments, and a commission was named to study the situation and bring in specific recommendations for amendments to the Code. It is interesting to note that the persons who visited the Presidential Palace are almost the same ones that recently tendered their support to the President in return for his radio speech calling for national unity which was reported in the smbassy despatch No. 20491 of November 6, 1944. It would appear, therefore, that this group now feels that the President is dependent upon them for support and they intend to exact a hard bargain for the continuance of this support.
When it became known that this reunion had taken place, public reaction was quick to develop; other prominent agriculturists entered the arena against the Labor Code, and Vanguardia Popular and the labor unions wore quick to rush to its defonso. Minister of Agriculture Peralta, in an interview published in the DIARIO of November 26, stated that it was his conviction that the Labor code would have to be amendod to conform to conditions of reality. In the same issue a ppeared a statement by Minister of Labor Brenes in which he stated that, while the Government was always prepared to amond the Code when it was evident that it was operating unjustly, there was no possibility of either suspending or canceling the Code provisions. As might be expected, the reaction of organized labor to the proposals to modify the Code has been strong. The Vanguardia Popular press had already hinted that, if necessary, La bor gains would be defended by a general strike, and on November 24 a spokesman for the Rerum Novarum declared in a radio speech that Father Nuñezi organization would call a general strike of its members should the right to dismissal wages be taken from agricultural workers. Furthermore, it has been given out that the Rerum Novarum would work in cooperation with the to oppose the modification of the code, and the Rerum Novarum has let it be known that the Archbishop of Costa Rica, Monseñor Sanabria, had agreed not to oppose a general strike should one become necessary. The Vanguardia press has also taken the attitude that the real