Steve Dittmer, Contributing Editor

Two Conventions – A Study in Contradiction
Having attended both the R-CALF and the Cattle Industry annual conventions – the latter where NCBA, CBB, ANCW, Cattle-Fax and National Cattlemen’s Foundation meet — I was struck by the contrasts I observed.

The obvious first comparison, of course, is sheer size. At the national R-CALF convention, there were never more than 100 cattlemen in the room at any time during the three days. At NCBA-CBB joint sessions, thousands of cattlemen crammed huge theaters and ballrooms. Committee sessions had 25 to 50 people in attendance setting policy. Their joint board of directors’ meeting had twice the number of people as R-CALF’s “all-in” sessions. NCBA, CBB and ANCW registered over 6,000 attendees. I haven’t seen any convention report from R-CALF.

Of course, for those of you who haven’t attended NCBA and CBB conventions, it should be said that information is presented in both separate policy and checkoff sessions as well as jointly. But only dues-paying NCBA members can vote on policy issues and only CBB board members can vote on checkoff items.

It appears obvious from the numbers that the NCBA-CBB-ANCW groups enjoy an overwhelming share of the support of U.S. cattlemen, compared to R-CALF. And obviously, only a handful of those thousands of attendees worked for packers, regardless of R-CALF contentions that packers dominate NCBA.

R-CALF had very little committee activity at all during their convention. The only committee scheduled for a real meeting was an International Trade Committee, and they met just before the end of convention, after final policy had been adopted. NCBA-CBB has dozens of subcommittee and committee sessions where policy and priorities are set before the board and membership sessions vote. And the committees get input from lots of sources as part of the decision-making process.

And while NCBA President Jan Lyons pointedly reminded USDA Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns that there were several points in the Canadian Rule on which NCBA had serious concerns, the notation was done in a firm but professional manner that indicated a willingness to listen and NCBA’s intention to justify its positions with facts. That left USDA the room to respond, explain and adjust if necessary. By contrast, USDA officials were treated a bit roughly from the floor of the R-CALF meeting.

In fact, NCBA’s extensive subcommittee and committee approach, routed to a resolutions committee and then board and membership meetings, resulted in a detailed, 11-point resolution on the Canadian issue. Printed copies of over 100 other resolutions were ready for the membership to review and vote on.

By contrast, at the R-CALF convention, resolutions were considered from the floor. No printed copies of the proposed resolutions were available at the door of the session. Several of the roughly dozen resolutions were withdrawn by their authors or held for study because of confusion as to whether policy already existed or because there was another resolution being proposed that dealt with the same issue.

Many of the R-CALF resolutions evidently came from individual members rather than from a committee. They put the proposed resolutions up on a screen and discussed and amended each of them from the floor. As one member commented, if their members were in the least conformists, there would be no need for an R-CALF to exist. Consequently, they spent over two hours working over a half-dozen resolutions, deleting phrases, adding phrases, re-inserting deleted phrases, questioning the appropriateness of the resolution itself, etc., etc. The chairwoman of the session had no easy time keeping track of which amendment or version was on the floor. The suggestion from the floor that next time the employment of a professional parliamentarian might be advised was met with a stony silence from the chair.

One member, perhaps making an oblique reference to the chaos, suggested that maybe R-CALF should have a committee study a more appropriate organizational structure and perhaps even examine the idea of term limits for officers. That too was met with stony silence.

In general, it seems such an ultra-democratic group appears uncomfortable with the delegation of matters to a committee.

After my years of watching cattlemen try to keep government out of their business, it was interesting to watch R-CALF members operate so differently. They want government involvement – to carry out their own wishes, even if they are in the minority.

They firmly believe that government should not necessarily carry out the wishes of the majority. They want government to protect their vision of the cattle industry – they are not interested in the “beef” industry – at the expense of other industry sectors they do not like.

In fact, they even want protection from other cattlemen; cattlemen whose innovations are designed to improve industry efficiency and attune beef products more closely with consumer demand. They are demanding that government agencies and Congress protect them from market requirements, business practices or competition they deem unfair.

The over 100 resolutions considered at the NCBA session covered a wide array of the total interaction of cattlemen with the world. Some R-CALF members would counter that they only concentrate on one or two areas of cattlemen’s interests and, consequently, wouldn’t be expected to have so many resolutions.

Of course, that could compromise R-CALF’s overall perspective — not seeing the forest for the trees. R-CALF has made it plain that, policy-wise, they are not concerned with the world everyone else lives in. That includes their customers, particularly those buyers of live cattle, packers — and those who try to use cattle as a raw material. The members at their convention, who so fiercely defend the cow-calf producer at the exclusion of everyone else, somehow believe they exist in a vacuum, requiring no meaningful interaction with the rest of the world. They regard as unfair and unreasonable any demands from the marketplace that they should have to worry about anything after the ranch gate.

The rest of the world has demonstrated an overwhelming rejection of that notion. And R-CALF has embraced the strategy that to protect their limited vision, that wish for a limited scope and narrow “job description,’ legal action will be their primary tool.

They are determined that the producers of the raw material — the cow-calf producer — should call the tune for the rest of the industry.

The two conventions just reinforce the vast chasm between the two approaches.