The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-12-28

lron-maklng. Ihe increased profits OF the
manufacturers increased largely the value of
the lands on which the iron-ore is mined, and
it is the value of the lands from which the
coal is dug that constitutes one of the prin-
cpal items in the cost of iron. The increase
in the value of the coal-lands especially has
been enormous, frequently tenfold and over
so that lands which went begging in 1860
have since sold for $500 and $1,000 an acre.
The largest profits OF the Pennsylvania protec-
ZIONIST ring have been made out of the in
creased value thus given to iron-lands, coal
lands railroads running between the two, and
furnaces and rolling mills. In order TO main
tain these prices and sell more lands at the
figure, it was of course necessary to work the
lands and take out the coal. In order to sell
the coal it was necessary to bring it to mar
ket. To bring it to market required more
railroads, the railroads more iron, and the
iron more coal. So more coal was mined,
and more railroads were built, and more iron
was smelted, and more coal was wanted and
the price Of coal was kept up pretty we'll, and
the price of coal lands was kept up very we'll
indeed. But it is very evident that the pro-
cess could not go on forever. And although
the ring maintained the duty on coal, which
prevented New England from getting it from
Nova Scotia, and thereby gave increased coal
transportation to the new coal
roads; and although the ring gave
its whole support with might
and main to every corrupt subsidy -jobbing
and land. grabbing railroad scheme that pro-
missed the least consumption of iron and coal;
and although the ring systematically indorsed
every scheme for raising money here or in
Europe that would ever so remotely add to
the consumption of coal ond iron, without re-
gard to its merits in any other respect; yet, in
spite of all these ingenious efforts the time
arrived wheu it became evident that con-
sumption could not possibly continue to in
crease in the same ratio as production, and
prices in 1867 commenced to decline so
rapidly and SO steadily that in the spring of
1868 they were as low as they had ever been
since 1884, with the sole exception of the
temporary panic at the outbreak of the war
If the market and the coal-producers had
been left to themselves the inevitable result
would have been a further decline in prices,
resulting in a compulsory stoppage of works
on the mines least favorably situated, and
continuance of work on those whose ex-
tremely favorable location enabled them to
take coal to market at a profit even at the
low prices then ruling. The effect of this
suspension of work at one of the mines would
naturally have been to depreciate the value
of the mine itself materially; and as a large
proportion of the mines had been within the
last few years purchased by the different rail-
road companies leading to the mining re-
gions, not, it is said, without some occasional
''perquisites' for individual directors, de-
cline in mining property would have involved
proportionate decline in many leading rail
road stocks, and stoppage of all further
sales by the directors aforesaid or by others
of valuable mining property to the railroad
companies at $1,000 and more an acre. It
therefore became the object of all parties
interested in this neat little combination to
prevent the decline in railroad stocks and
mining lands by preventing the suspension
of work in individual mines, and hence the
manoeuvres to produce general suspensions
whenever required.
In order to prevent the general public
from finding out how they have been de-
ceived by these coal Land, ron-land, and rail-
road and canal companies, all the mines have
beer kept going, new ones have been opened
in quick succession, and enormous new pur-
chases of lands have been made quite re-
Gently, in face of the notorious fact that for
four years past the production of coal has
every year largely exceeded the consumption,
and nothing but periodical strikes has saved
the entire coal, iron, and railroad ring from
hopeless and general bankruptcy. Although
last year on q production of thirteen million
tons of anthracite there was q surplus, in
spite of a suspension averaging from six
weeks to over three months, yet in less than
eleven months of. this year nearly fifteen
millions of tons have been mined, producers
stocked, and in spite of the suspension now
threatening to become general, dealers have
been unable to force an advance in prices.
The true state of the case then in this: in
order to maintain the present high prices of
coal and iron lands and coal and iron rail-
ways which are the direct result of the ini-
quities of our present radical tariff, the
Pennsylvania protectionist ring are know
ingly trying to maintain production of coal
beyond the wants of consumption, and are
trying to throw the burden of the inevitable
loss resulting from their course upon the
laboring men by forcing them to suspend,
and upon the public by forcing up the price
of coal. They have twice before succeeded
in the same scheme, but this time they will
fail. Their proceedings are too well under-
stood to deceive third time. The attempt
to force the price has already signally
| failed. The suspension of work, we are
| informed, is likely to prove no better success,
the idea of general strike being very un-
| favorably considered by large proportion of
the working men, The fate of these schemers
will not materially differ from that of ths
grain spectators, whisky gamblers, and boot
and shoe dealers whose history has recently
attracted slight share of public attention.
| But their fate will meet with far wider
range of public interest, owing to the magni-
| tude of the industries involved and the very
large amount of suffering which their collapse
would entail. But apart from individual suf-
fering, the public will gain enormously by
the approaching end of this monstrous COM
bination. Not that we ever hope to see re.
turned to the people the millions wrung from
them under the disguise of a tariff, but that
the people may profit by the dear-bought les
son: that in "protecting" an industry they are
only raising up greedy and INSCRIPTIONS