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The stage is set for a dramatic struggle between Gerald Ford and consumer forces in Congress over the price of energy in this country. As if to punctuate the onset of this “battle of the billions,” the giant oil companies’ recent price in­creases signaled the second lap in their drive for $1­per-gallon gasoline. President Ford’s…

Why can’t we buy can­ning jar lids? That’s the question asked by home canners around the country in letters that are flooding government agencies and consumer groups these days. G.A. Bell of Alexandria, Ky., writes to call “atten­tion to a situation which is putting an obstacle in the way of the home gardening program. This…

Mildred E. Hershner of upstate New York wants us to do something about law­yers. She, like many con­sumers, writes to complain about lawyers — their in­competence, their delays, their fees, or their deceit, as the particular case may be. These people express their feelings with indigna­tion and frequently lump to­gether all bar associations and all…

Hysterical Mike McCor­mack, the Democratic con­gressman and darling of the nuclear power industry, was at his most feverish pitch recently at a re­sources conference in We­natchee, Wash. Along with a salvo of McCarthyite accusations against critics of the giant energy utility corporations, he had this nonsense to say: “Reducing our imports by a million barrels…

The American Society of Mechanical Engineers is not exactly a household phrase. But the technical codes and standards it develops for industry and government affect the pock­etbooks and safety of most consumers. THE ASME has issued standards for gas pipelines, boilers, plumbing, food and drug equipment, hoists and cranes and hundreds of other parts and…

It is time for the Congress to take on the Nixon-shaped Supreme Court before more doors to the courthouse are closed to all citizens and taxpayers except the rich and the super-rich. In a series of decisions over the past year, Chief Justice Warren Burger and a majority of his associates seem determined to reverse…

In the Great Hall of the New York City Chamber of Commerce there occurred recently a most ironic legislative hearing on a bill to establish a state-owned bank. Sponsored by the New York Assembly Committee on Banks, the two-day ses­sion in the portrait-ringed hall heard witnesses for and against the proposal to put the state…

In the Great Hall of the New York City Chamber of Commerce there occurred recently a most ironic legislative hearing on a bill to establish a state-owned bank Sponsored by the New York Assembly Committee on Banks, the two-day ses­sion in the portrait-ringed hall heard witnesses for and against the proposal to put the state…

At age 19, weighing 110 lbs, Franklin L. Gage is a leading candidate for the title: “America’s toughest kid.” Working out of a small, drafty bedroom-office in a rowhouse three blocks from Congress, Gage is organizing a national petition drive against nuclear power and for solar energy. As coordinator for the Task Force Against Nuclear…

In a discussion of energy issues with consumer representatives at the White House last month, Vice-President Nelson Rockefeller could not resist one prideful remark. Speaking of himself in the third person, he said, “If the vice-president’s brother hadn’t made a deal with Libya to leak oil during last winter’s embargo, we wouldn’t have been as…