The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1889-11-26

cannot immediately or greatly depreSS
the price of raw sugars, because by
long usage in the trade that price is
established by the quotations in the
London market, and as nine-tenths of
our raw sugars come from abroad,
their shippers have choice of markets,
and will not come here unless they
have assurance that the New York
market is as good as the London mar
ket, and this assurance they can com
mand by contracting for the sale of
their cargoes before starting. Yet,
even with this protection, the sellers
will eventually find some difference,
for, instead of dealing with sixteen in
dependent buyers, they now deal prac-
tically with one, and the diminished
consumption caused by the artificial
stimulation of the price of refined
sugar, brought about by the trust, will
inevitably affect the value of the raw
product under the operation of the
law of demand and supply.
Neither can we approximate the in
fuence of the whisky trust on the
price of corn, because it is but one of
many buyers in the home market, and
it consumes too small fraction of the
entire domestic product to enable it to
dictate prices It's influence on other
industries will be considered in an
other and more important relation in
my next paper.
But the Standard Oil trust is an
example to our land. The producer
of petroleum cannot, like the foreign
sugar planter, send this product in
differently, and at the same cost, to
the European or the American mar
ket; nor can he, like our farmer, find
numberless other purchasers in the
home market. He is largely depend
ent-has been at times entirely de-
pendent-on the Standard combina-
tion to buy his crude oil. Has he
shared in the phenomenal prosperity
of that combination ? Has it ever
paid him fairly remunerative prices
for that product, which in itself has
turned into golden streams?
On the contrary, during the highest
tides of its prosperity, his business has
been vibrating between actual loss and
lean and beggarly profits.
ITO strike oil" was formerly a
phrase implying the sure acquisition
of great and immediate wealth, but as
the refining business passed into the
grasp of a single combination, the
whole oilproducing territory passed
into a state of chronic depression" I"
And so we are justified in saying
that In it's dealings with those who
produce it's raw material the trust re-
veals itself wherever it's power and
tendency can have full play in the
character of true and unmistakable
monopoly.
THE CONSUMERS OF ITS PRODUCTS.
We may next ask how the trust
has dealt with that larger body, the
general public, who purchase and con-
sumo its products. This question
have already virtually answered in
the paper reciting the enormous
profits of each one of the combinations
Investigated profits so far in excess
of the possible returns of legitimate
industry as to imply beyond question
the spoliation of the consumer by the
single or overshadowing producer in
the market. Stress is constantly
and especially in behalf of the Stan
dard trust-laid upon the argument
that self-interest will always prompt a
seller to content himself with moder-
ate and reasonable profits in order to
secure the largest range of customers,
and the public is assured that in this
principle it will find protection against
extortionate charges. But does any
one argue that self-interest impels the
owner of patent upon an article of
general use or necessity, or even, like
the Bell telephone, of general conven-
ience, to content himself with moder-
ate profits in order to increase to the
utmost the number of purchasers?
The argument has force only in re-
spect to articles whose use is volun-
tary with the people, and which they
must, therefore, be tempted to buy.
On the other hand, as long as there is
or can be but one seller of an article
which people are almost or actually
compelled to buy, that seller can and
will sell at price t pat brings to him
the largest possible returns, or, in
other words, at monopoly price.
When the patent on the telephone ex-
pires and other manufacturers can
supply the market the public will get
telephones much cheaper, while still
paying reasonable profits to those who
make them.
In the case of the telephole the law
of patents has for fixed term entire
" obliterated competition; in the case
of trusts their own successful combi-
nation has more or less fully obliser-
ated competition. AS each one Of
/ IL Al e