The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1882-10-19
Mr.. Tucker ON the Tariff.

Mr. Tucker on the Tariff.
AT the Fort Defiance Rally on Thursday
last, the speaker whose effort elected the great
er applause, was Hon. Jno. Randolph Tucker,
member of Congress from the 9th District
The speech was one of the N ost extraordinary
to which we haye ever listened. 1t bristled, AS
all of Mr.. fuckers speeches do, with catch
words and anecdotes The anecdotes We're
told inimitably The pose, gesture and facial
contortion were the complete realization of
saiting the action to the word and the word to
the action. AS Grimaldi, Mr.. Tucker is a big
success AS a political leader he is dead
failure He appeals to the risibles rather than
the reason, and whenever he undertakes to
leave the field of the comic. stumbles into
errors both of fact and deduction. There was
not one proposition advanced in his speech of
Thursday that was not open to the most com
plete recitation. His contortions OF the facts
of history were almost as conspicuous as his
contortions of the face, and some OF them quite
as ridiculous. We have neither the space nor
inclination to follow him thro' his two hours
effort, but there were one or two points to
which we shall refer in connection with the
tariff. We select these, not because they were
more vulnerable than other portions of his
speech but as fair specimens of the whole.
In undertaking to prove that protection en-
abled monopolIes to realize enormous profits,
Mr.. Tucker stated that from information de-
ha oo,npilar Of
the iron and steel statistics for the 10th census,
it had been demonstrated that the Bessemer
steel works realized 81 per cent ret profit an
nually, on their capital, and that with this
amount only about nine per cent was expended
for labor. We presume this conclusion was
not arrived at through any investigation of Mr.
Tucker. He doubtless received it second
hand In speech in the Senate on the Goth
of March last. Mr.. Beck of Kentucky said
"The next question is, who gets the benefit
of The tariff tax? Mr.. Swank shows 1t all in
his report. The capital and business OF the
Bessemer steel rail Companies for the year
1880 is thus given:
Amount of capital real and personal in the
business S20975 800
Cost of labor, 1880 349
Cost of material, 81 .S2092o
Making labor and material cost, SAL .757 PIT
The value of the products when
sold was, 80 .o05.2lO
Deduct capital and labor, 41.757.277
And it leaves a net profit of $14.047 .933
% n n 81 init oil md
the pay of labor $4930000, is SIS per cent;
SO per cent labor, 66.9 per cent profit to the cap
italst. Mr.. Swank tries TO show that there
are some places where they have not made
Jas in Virginia and elsewhere"
The reader will observe that Mr. fuckers
statement was but repetition of Mr.. Beck's,
except that Mr.. Tucker throws out the frac-
tions. Both give Mr.. Swank as their authority
Now let us see what Mr.. Swank says:
LII letter dated April 25th, and read before
the House of Representatives on the 9th of
May, 1882, Mr.. Swank, referring to Senator
Beck's statement, writes:
There are many inaccuracies in the above
statement, in addition to its supreme error of
attributing an average profit by the Bessemer
steel manufacturers of 66.9 per cent upon their
invested capital The Senator erred in stating
that the exhibit he gave referred only to 1.-THE
Bessemer steel rail companies" He should
have said that it referred to "Bessemer and
open hearth steel works" The correction is
important, because there were in the census
year only eleven Bessemer steel works, while
of Bessemer and open hearth steel works there
were thirty six in the same year. The Senator
erred in confounding labor and MATERIAL with
capital and labor" and assuming that the
sum OF the first two items is exactly equal to
the sum of the last two viz: Sal .737277 lie
erred also in reference TO the special agent IN
the phrase, Mr.. Swank tries to show &c.
''Mr Swank" was and still is sworn officer
of the government, and in the performance of
the difficult task of compiling the statistics OF
great industry he tried only to show that l;H
could do his duty and accurately set down
facts regardless of theories" "The
mistake made by Senator Beck and others in
assuming that the total value of all products"
1855 805 210) produced by the Bessemer and
open hearth steel works of the United States
In the census year 1880, was obtained with an
invested capital of only $20.975.999, would
not have occurred if they had reflected that
these products were not made solely or even
largely with the machinery and other aids and
appliances of the works mentioned, but that
they were the final result of successive pre-
paratory operations and processes OF manu-
facture which may have represented in the
census year an invested capital OF SlO0.0O .00O.
The $20.975.9 99 expresses only the capital in
vested in machinery and accessories required
in the immediate conversion OF pig iron and
other raw materials into Bessemer or open
hearth STEEL and does not include the capital in
vested by Bessemer and open hearth steel
manufacturers in iron ore and coal mines, in
limestone Quarries, in blast furnaces, in foun-
dries and machine Shops in car works, in
brick yards in lateral railroads, and in other
enterprises necessary to the production and
handling of these raw materials
ITO say that the whole capital invested in the
production of Bessemer or open hearth steel
in this country is represented by $20975999
is as erroneous as to assume that the Whole
capital of the farmer who grows wheat is rep
resented by the cost of his threshlng machine"
"The showing of $14047 933
of profits, which form the conclusion of the
sum in arithmetic given by Senator Beck, falls
short of accuracy, therefore, in two important
particulars First, these profits If correctly |
stated should have been made to apply to 30 |
Bessemer and open hearth steel works instead
of to "eleven Bessemer steel rail companies"
Second, they are alleged to have been derived
from a capital of $20.975.999, whereas the
true capital upon which calculation OF prot
its should have been based was p706d6Gy joe
GCUttS us NtTy6 w Z w uOt uhdCloeoAu "Hi'
significance Senator Beck intended to attach
to the statement that labor was paid but
"a 93034 or 8.S per cent of the price received
for the products of the Bessemer and open
hearth steel works of the country in the cen
sus year 1880. Did not labor enter largely into
the $3.50 1926 1928, which represents the value OF
the raw materials consumed by these works?
Did it not form the principal element in the
cost of these raw materials Does not SEN
ator Beck know that these raw materials
could not have been produced without vast
mount of labor, which, of course, somebody
ipaid for, and the cost of which is largely rep
resented in the value of the finished product?
Does he not know that the principal element
in the cost of all manufactured products is
labor? Even in Europe where labor is paid
low wages, this is the case"
Now Mr.. Tucker occupies one of these two
positions: list. He knowingly mlsrepresented |
facts or end, He was ignorant of the facts.
We prefer to ascribe his errors to the latter
cause, for we are not willing to believe that
ne would deliberately make statements and
quote authority with the knowledge that the
quoted directly antagonized the
made But is there excuse for ig-
norance in man occupying the position that
Mr. Tucker does? He assumes not only to be
well posted on all tariff matters, and to speak