New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1869-08-21
POLITICAL ECONOMY
BY HORACE GREELEY.
XIII.
WIFI INTEREST OF CONSUMERS-IR0F n.

n;zad as Producers and Consumers respectively. III
nv corception all who are OF any account are both
Producers and Consumers, with substantially ldeh-
tical interests suffering by eachothers mslortunes
and prospecting through each others prosperity
T,,os once q lahorer for wages; / now pay wages
IT. thor receive them: yet cannot realize that
q; :; Io 1, interest now than it formerly was that
fair davis work should command fair days wages
For. since live by making newspapers 1or when
wide capacious market is Indispensable know that
reduction of the great body of our people TO pc
uniarv condition akin to that of the coolies OF east
ern Asia or even that of the peasahTy Vi EuioPe'
would preclude their buying, to any cohSiuei"Olo
extent new spapers, or books, or any literary ""io'
whatever so that my loss by the eNtehSiN Cue"po
I'M, of Hired Labor would decidedly overDalance my
gaip I can better afford to pay fair llVlng wages
for the labor i need than TO OBTAIN ~
far cheaper at the cost OF reSIric'ins
the market for my products to the compaIatNeS
small class who are able to live on their mherte" VI
accumulated wealth And my case Is suOStah'iaiiy
tbat Of all who live by selling the products OF their
industry to satisfy the wants of Others, ana tnus
minister TO their own. 1t may seem, indeed, thaC
those who grow food or who produce any other OF
the first necessares of life exempt from the ope
ration of this law; but in fact they are not IheH
market is enlarged the prices they receive are sig
nay enhanced, by the diversion OF multitudes' VINO
would naturally have been their competitors in'o
pursuits which render them lifelong customers IN
stead The inevitable enhancement OF the price
commanded by farms in township or county, conse-
auent upon the establishment and vigorous prOSecu-
ton of manufactures mining therein Is TAMIL
lar exemplificaton of this law. A new industry
will often give value even to powders or rugged
lodges of granite, which had previously been not
merely worthless but positive drawback, subtract
ing from the value of the lands on which they were
found Thus forest which the owner was slowly
patienty DESTROYING by AK and fire. at cost OF so
To kO per acre. has been suddenly transformed into
considerable property by the erection of furnace
or factory the construction of railroad IN It's VI
cinty Thus many substances, once deemed worth
less have become valuable through the mere pro-
gress of industry knowledge, civilization; as many
more doubtless. will do as mankind grows wiser
Thus mines Of Coal and of Minerals, over which
savages have roamed heedlessly for centuries, are
discovered and worked by their civilized successors
proving almost inexhaustible sources OF comfort
power, and wealth.
There be those who say, Let us continue to draw
our Metals, as well az our Wares and Fabrics mainly
from Europe because Labor and Capital are so cheap
there that the products of British mines can be laid
"a rails across our richest beds of Coal and Iron Ore
far cheaper than we can make thence the rails we
! needp 1t seems to that the cheapness here as
serted is fallaciOus, mistaken, illusOry Admit
hat fewer dollars will buy from Great Britain the
rails required, they will cost in my view far more
of our Labor than would similar rails made from our
own ore on our own SOIL For every tun of rails made
here tends to increase the capacity skill experience,
whereby our people are enabled 70 make better and
cheaper rails through all future time, and to grade
the ways over which our diverse materials approach
and mingle with each other The cheapness of Brit
ish Iron is in good part the result of British
| skill and knowledge evinced in the COM
miugling Of diverse ores so as to produce
a metal of far greater value than could have been
obtained from either of those ores smelted by it.
self Great Britain has for years been thoroughly
| gridironed and chequered by railroads and canals
thatsuch commingling is far more easily and cheaply
effected on her soil than elsewhere but we are
profting by her example and following swiftly in
her footsteps 1t is but few years since the vast
deposits of choice Iron Ore on the eastern shore of
| Lake Superior were reached by a railroad; and
| already they are extensively drawn upon to pro-
| duco Iron not only in Michigan (near Detroit, but
! In Illinois lat ChicagO,) and for steel-makng at
Pittsburgh. At length, Indiapa-Yhich boosts the
possession of 1900 square miles of better Coal for
| Iron-makng than is found elsewhere-has been
prompted to erect great furnaces near Greencaste,
| at Indianapolis and perhaps in other localities,
where her numerous railroads may cheaply con-
| centrate the Coal of her southwestern counties
| aud the Ore of Lake Superior, beside the Lime
stone which extensively dndeTlies her soil, and
| thus produce (she calcuates) Very superior Pig
Iron at a very moderate cost, though the Ore has
travelled hundreds of miles to meet her Coal rather
more than halfway. So ST. Louis is making con-
siderable Pig Iron drawing by rail to herself the
Coal of Southern Illinois from the northeast, TO
of fba
VEST and she expects to make much MORE and to
better advantage, when she shall have completed
her bridge oyer the Missouri, so that the Coal may
be run by rail from the mines directly to her fur
naces. Thus on every side we are perfecting the
conditions whereby Iron can be cheapened, we
could not perfect them in the absence Of market
for American Iron. The railroad whereby Ore is
brought from Lake Superior would not have been
built in the absence of O demand for that Ore; and
so with that which is destined TO bring the Iron
Mountain pecemeal to st. Louis. We shall thus ere
long have cheaper American Iron without reducing
our makers to European wages, if we have but the
foresight and patience TO seek il Alright and not re-
peat the blunder of 1885, when Protective Tariff
was broken down under which we were supplying
ourselves with American Bar at less than 500 per
tun, while, after few years of Rermue Tariff, we
were buying British bars at $50 per tun.i
Yet would not induce belief that Iron will ever
be made in this country for few dollars per tun in
the average as will buy it from Europe while the
disparity in the ordinary wages Of labor shall remain
80 great as at present A tun Of Iron embOdes so
many days Labor in quarrying or digging smelling,
pudding &c, &c, and very little else than Labor
directly applied to it's productions and all know that
this labor Is very much cheaper in Europe than heres
Take all the work done in producing thousand
tufs Of Iron in this country and III average cost VIII
fall little short of "a in gold, for each days faith