New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1889-11-23
A TARIFF ISSUE Nv THE CONCRETE.

pamphlet has been issued by the Iron and
Steel Association which ought 10 have much more
interest for the people of this country than it is
likely to have. II is entitled :" All About Tin
Plates" and for reason not easily explained
many people this country have come to think
the tin-pate question one of those mysteries about
the tariff which nobody can understand. The
pamphlet would be even more forcibles than 1t is.
If it embraced facts down TO the latest dates but
though it only shows quantities imported as late
as 1897 it tells story which ought TO be regarded
with deep interest. Nobody now makes tin plates
in this country Probably nobody will, until the
Government interpOses to put them on Il level with
other products Of iron. Yet there ought to be
employed, in making tin plates in this country,
in rolling the iron sheets, in smelling the pig iron,
in getting out the iron ore. the coal and the lime
stone FOR their production about 80, 900 men, who
would support with comfort a population of a
quarter OF a million.
The statistics Of the Iron and Steel Association
on this topic do not go back before the war. and
IL may be mentioned that the quantity of tin
plates imported yearly in 1s5s-l86l was about
70, 900, 600 lbs. and rose to III ,000 900 lbs in
1867, or over sc, 900 tons The record Of the
citation begins with SO, 900 gross tons imported in
1871, and ends with 2s3, s36 gross tons in 1877
IL may he added that in 1888 the imports were
297,S70 gross tons, valued in foreign ports at
9,752l 80, and that in seven months of 1889
the imports have been 462, 000,000 lbs, against
3s0, 100000 lbs. in the same months Of 1888, and
the value sl3,377, 0sj against s11, PA last
year. Thus we are now paying at the rate OF
s21 900 900 yearly for 335, 600 tons of tin plates
besides freight, insurance and profits Of import
ers Tho duty paid TO the Government is not loss
but goes 10 reduce the public debt. The rest of
the cost nearly O0,O0O,O0O in twenty years
besides all freights and profits, has gone TO foreign
crs for the production Of articles which American
mines, furnaces mills and worIImen could have
turned out had the duty been in correspondence
with that on other forms of iron and steel.
For the tin plates, so-callel, are simply plates
or sheets Of iron or Steel with coating of tin not
exceeding . TO per cent of their weight. Most
Of the tin used by Great Britain is imported, the
Cornwall tin being less fitted to this particular
use, and therefore mostly exported so that the
tin used in making plates can be obtained here
from the same countries about as cheaply as IL IS
obtained in Great Britain. Yet the British manu-
facturc, which has enormously increased, has been
and is kept alive by the American demand. The
figures given in the pamphlet show production
in Great Britain of 424 773 tons in SS7, of which
g, 600 tons were retained lOr Drlusn cOhSumPuoH
while the quantity imported by the United States
WAS 2s3s36 tons, nearly all from Great Britain.
In 1888, it may he added, Great Britain exported
391 POI tons, Of which 292,623 went to this
country, and our imports from all other countries
were only about 1000 tons.
Practically this country pays over s2O,OoOOOo
year to British miners and irOnworlIers for TINS
one product, while American mines and furnaces
and workmen who could produce the same tin
platcs are standing idle. For there has been no
year Of late in which the average capacity OF Good
furnaces not in blast has not been more than the
$50. 600 tons required to supply this country with
tin plates, and n, year in which mines of far more
than that capacity have not been idle, and no
veer in which more than 900 Americans have
not been seeking employment. Why should the
500. 100000 be sent abroad, and the men at nome
be left idle; to be supported by friends or by the
Nationr