Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1872-08-30

but few furnaces now In operation, In the
eastern region, though the quality Of tie
ore is superior to any found in
the State, showing by analysis
an average of about 6S per cant of pure
iron.
It is to be hoped that with the present
high price ofiron many of the extinct fur
naces win be revived, and capital and
labor win TOW to aland of so much promise
to the industrious and energetic. Out OF
the ninety-one counties in the State more
than thirty can supply iron ore in sufficient
quantities TO run from one to fifty furnaces.
In connection with this subject, and as
stimulus to capitalists to engage in the
manufacture of iron-certainly one of the
most profitable industries of the day-we
reproduce the following article, on the price
of iron, from a recent issue ofthe st. Louis
Republican; -.t E-+ GIL
"The extraordinary rise in the price of
iron and iron fabrics which took place in
England, the great centre of the iron trade,
a few months ago, is having universal eff
feet; IL is felt, not only in England, but In
this country, and indeed, throughout the
world. 1t is now said that the cause of
this increase in the price of iron is an adj
vance in the price or rather the cost Of
coal, and this Is, no doubt, partly tue,
though it is not the whole explanation.
Coal and iron are twin brothers; they are
to each other as supplement- and compile
ment. When coal is touched iron In
stantly responds, and when iron is touched
he whole scheme of civilization responds;
1 for it is one Of the most easily demonstra-
bic truths of the day, that q nations civil
ization is measured by the per capita
amount of iron 1t consumes year. The
cause of the increase of the cost Of coal in
England is said to be the increasing depths
of the mines, requiring more painful and
expensive processes for lifting it from the
floors of the collieries to the surface.
Within year past the price of coal has
nearly doubled at the pits mouth.
This is the starting point of series of
effects of almost endless length and Of
universal manifestation. Thus, London
paper informs us, there is an increase in
the cost of building of so per cent; an in
crease of 80 per cent. in the cost Of ma
chinery; CT SO per cent. in copper; 4S per
cent. in tin; Al per cent. in nickle; SO per
cent. in brass; 53 per cent. in chains; Ill
per cent. in iron gas tubes; so per cent. in
wrought nails; So per cent. in iron bars; 95
per cent. in cut nails; and proportionate
increase not only in all iron fabrics, but in
all articles In the manufacture of which
iron machinery or iron tools are used.
This really means all things; there is moth
ing eaten, drunk, or worn, that has not
felt the inhCence of this sc in the price of
coal and iron. Cheap coal and iron are
blessings whose value cannot be measured;
they make fool and all other necessaries
cheap and are the indication of iDnumera-
BILE comforts which cannot be had without
them.
THE full effect of this great advance in
the price of coal and iron in Z gland has
not exhibited itself in this country; but it
will do 80, by and by. One of these effects
will be to approximate the cost of English
fabrics of all kinds more nearly to the
American cost, and thus destroy the neces-
sity for that protective tariff which we now
impose to bring the English prices up to
ours The percentage of increase in the
articles we have referred to above is al
ready about equal to the average of the
protective duties imposed by our present
tariff act. If, then, as our protectionists
argue, the chief end of tariff is to protect
our manufacturers against the cheap pro-
ducts OF foreign pauper labor, the rise In
| English coal and iron does this more
effectually than any law could, and there is
no longer a necessity for protective tariffs.
When British iron was S22 ton, duty of
81 raised it to $50, and this with the cost
of carriage across the ocean, would brig
the price up to that at which Americs n
! manufacturers told US they could afford TO
! sell. But when British iron goes up los 3
| a ton, the increase is 81 ton, aud there
is no longer 4 need for the duty of 81 i'm
posed for protection of the home manufac-
.ureT. The last Congress strained point
to reduce our tariff 10 per cent, pitiful
aud almost uusppFeciableH reduction; and
the Republican party have claimed the graf
itude of the country for this Insignificant
diminution of the tax on labor and con
! suuption-a diminutiOn so small
that the people really have not been
abie 10 feel the relief 1t was TO have
caused. But at the next Congress, the
rise in the cost of British coal and iron, to-
gether with the rise in the cost Of all Brit
! ish manufactures, will warrant a demand
|
duty now existing, and the elimination Of
protection from our system.
''If the rise in the price of British iron and
coal is caused chiefly by the increasing
depth of the British coal mines, the cause
is not only perpetual, but one of a constant
ly increasing effect. Il is irremediable.
There is then opened an interest
ing field fer speculation about its
ultimate effect. Cheap coal and iron
are the agents with which England
controls the trade of the world, and largely
controls the world itself. She governs In
deed, with a rod of iron. But the moment
her coal mines reach depth at which they
cannot be profitably worked in competition
with the almost superficial mines OF other
countries, her supremacy is gone, and her
decline as an industrial and commercial
power has begun. Whittier her lost
scep,rs of power will go, is q question to
be determined by the p-ica Of coal and iron.
Belgium and Germany would succeed TO a
large share OF EnglanG's lost power, but
our country, with its exhauStiess deposits
of better iron than the British, and its I'M