The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1881-11-19
rOFFICIAL PAPER.l
Saturday. November 10 1881

ting the Bessemer steel monopoly in way
which is extremely interesting. The his
tory of the monopoly is that in 1856,
Henry Bessemer, an Englishman, discov-
cred new process for making steel. As
far as the product was concerned there
was not much..of novelty.in what Mr.. Bess-
emer accomplished, for just as good
and even better steel was made. and made
abundantly before. But the great merit
of Bessemer's discovery was that it made
cheap article most essential to the prog
ress of CIVILIZATION, which was before dear.
And the whole world rejolced in the result
as one of the great achievements of the
nineteenth century. We say the whole
world; but we are mistaken; the United
States apparently did not rejoice. for a
portion Of its people, after waiting until
the new discovery had been proved sue
cess and so avoiding participation in the
loss and expense that is always incident
to an experiment in manufactures, went to
work to neutraliZe the benefit of Bessemer's
discovery, by depriving it of its special
ceeded in great degree in SO doing, by
inducing congress to impose a duty of
nearly 100 per cent on the import of all
Bessemer Steel imported from Europe,
and then augmenting the price of steel
that was made in this country to an equal.
or nearly an equal extent. 1t is also to
be noted as a further part of the history,
that the persons who sought and obtained
from congress the power to tax to such an
enormous extent the people and interests
of the country who desired to use the new
steel-the railroads more especially in the
first instance, and then those who use the
railroads for freight and travel-had pre-
viously acquired by purchase at very
low price, the extensive control of the pat
ent granted to Mr. Bessemer in the United
States and that they then, after being
thus doubly fortified against all possible
competition at home or from abroad,
formed a company, or ring, of some eleven
associates, and refused to allow any other
persons to engage in the manufacture of
the new steel, except on condition of the
paying of the American owners of the
patents, royalty so large as to be prac
tically destructive to all profit to all out
side parties.
The American people, by reason of the
tariff, are paying all the same as before |
for their Bessemer steel, or about double |
the price paid by the people of other coun-
tries, their compeers in wealth and civil |
zation
And how much does the tax at present |
amount to annually? Let us see. The
domestic production of steel rails for the |
year 1880, was 954, 46O net tons; the inn
portations were 1853, $50 tons. indicating
domestic consumption for the year, of L.,
112, 800 TONS The average price OF the
American product for the year 1880, was
$67.50 The average prices of Bessemer
rails in Great Britain for the same period
were between f6 and f7, or, from $50 to
S35. 1t is, therefore, clear that the pound
of flesh $2s per ton-which the tariff al
lows, was taken on all the Bessemer rails
bought and used about the United States
during the year 1880, and that this in
,rement of price, in consequence which
was tax on domestic consumption
amounted in the aggregate to S31, 1885,
,20. ThfaTy-one millions Of dollars!
Truly big sunni A sum SO large that the
mind is unable to take its measure except
,y instituting comparisons or finding out
low much the same number of
dollars viii buy of some other
commodities Let US therefore, as a help
o mental comprehension, institute some
# these tests or comparisons. Thus, if Q |