New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1852-12-15
IRON AND RAILROADS.

IRON AND nAlLhOADSs
Many persons have asked, Why can't our
people make Iron successfully at all times
under thirty per cent. duty'' We answer,
they can make some Iron under thirty per
cent. duty, twenty per cent. or even none at
all Iron Industry has now obtained such de-
velopment in this country that no possible per-
verseness of National policy can evermore ut
tery destroy it, There are peculiar qualities
of Iron which could be made here and sold at
profit although common Iron were lower than
it has ever yet been. And there are certain
localities at which choice Iron is now made and
sold at prices which defy Foreign competition,
Tariff or no Tariff.
But what the Country needs is not that
Peter Cooper or Henry NJ. Watts shall DO
enabled to make few hundreds or thousands
of tuns of Iron at profit, but that The Iron
product of the Country shall be brought into some
fair relation to our Home demand for Iron. We
have more and better Ores than any other
Nation. We have more ingenious Artificers
and Inventors We have Coal, Wood, Lime,
Food and other elements of production as
abundant and cheap as any other IrOn-making
people. If We could only adjust our public
policy so as steadily to produce at home the
Iron we need (Which will very soon reach Two
Millions of tuns per annum, worth at least
Sixty Millions of Dollars,) we could teach
the world how to make good and cheap Iron
within dozen years.
But one great impeachment 80 the general
production Of cheap Iron in this Country has
hitherto been the difficulty and expensiveness
of bringing together the requisite materials.
Sussex County, n. j., for example, is known
to be as rich in choice Iron and other minerals
as any other region it has lime also in abun-
dance but it has no Coal; and TO supply it
with the Coal, Flour &c, requisite in the ex-
tensve manufacture of Iron has been at all
times a costly und rtaking. Hence the pro-
duction of Iron there has been more expen-
sve by many per cent. than it ought to be.
But the present prices of Iron and the sue
cessof the Zinc Company which has lis mines
in Sussex are about to induce a signal and
| gratifying change. Several Railroads are now
in progress or in contemplation which will re-
duce the cost of bringing the various materials
together and sending the product to market
some fifty to eighty per cent. The Morris and
Essex Railroad, which now stops at Dover,
some twelve miles west of MOrristown, just on
the edge Of Sussex Co, is now being construct
ed fifteen miles further, past the Stanhope
Iron Works, and will doubtless be pushed TO
the Delaware River within 1854 From the
Delaware, a Railroad now actively agitated
will soon be constructed TO the great Susque.
hanna coalfed Of Pennsylvania, connecting at
Scranton with the Leggett's Gap Road, and so
forming the shortest route from this City TO
the West, thus supplying the Mineral Region
Of New-Jersey with Coal from Pennsylvania,
and Flour, Meat, &c, from the West at the
lowest rates. Another Railroad from the in.
tersection of the Newburgh Branch with the
Erie Railroad ct Chester will speedily be
driven through the heart of the mineral region
of Sussex TO the Delaware Water Gap, pass
ing the Zinc and other extensive mines on the
woy. Besides, Mr.. Peter Cooper is now build
ing Railroad from Waterloo on the Morris
Canal TO his mines at Andover Sussex Co.
I'll miles,) and has proposed to extend it to
the Zinc Mines g miles further) On terms
which are now under consideration. Such ex.
tension would reduce the cost of Transporting
the Znc Ore from the mines to Newark By at
least Fifty per cent
These are but samples of the facilities for
the cheap production of Iron which our British
rivals have long enjoyed, and which our Ameri-
can Iroa makers riu enjoy, not in one district
only, but throughout the Country, should the
present demand for Iron continue at something
like present prices for two years longer. The
way to Cheap Iron permanently lies through
the cheapening of the actual cost of producing
Iron and this will be effected by INCREASING and
extending the facilities for concentrating the
materials required in such production.
At present, all is activity and hope in the
Iron region of Nsw-Jersey. The vein Of
Franklinite in the Zinc locality is some four to
twenty feet thick, and has One Million Tuns Of