Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-12-17
TRUSTS AND PROTECTION.

The manufacturers of reaping and moving
machines have recently organized all the
establishments engaged In that industry
under single corporate charter, which the
parlance of the day calls Trust. They
will be panied to learn that the agricultural
mind places no trust in their assurances that
the object of the combination is not to raise
prices.
The farmers have somehow got it firmly
rooted in their minds that both the example
of other combinations and the laws OF COM
merclal human nature make it plain that
when all the manufacturers in a certain in
dustry combine 10 prevent competition, they
do SO for the purpose of keeping prices
above the level which would be fixed by the
free and natural action of that force. The
Master of the Illinois State Grange has in
formed the members of that organization
that the purpose of the combination is to
prevent the decline in the prices of
moving machines that would naturally take
place on the expiration of certain patents;
and the Grange has carried its utter lnfdel-
ity In the professions of Nervousness on the
part of the Trust, so far as to pass resolu-
ton demanding that moving and reaping
machines shall be placed on the free list.
1t must be said that on the logic of the
question the Grangers have the right of it.
The cause of protection has been fought on
the principle that the encouragement of
home industry will reduce prices by the
competition of domestic manufactures. That
assertion has been repeated so often in Con-
gress and on the stump that it Is indisputa-
bly, one of the a1ioms of the protective sys-
TEN. But here is another case OF pro-
tected industry which by a combination
virtually undertakes to defeat that tunda-
mental purpose of protection, and to prevent
the competitive reduction of prices which
is promised. Thus they not only antagonize
the principle and purpose of protection, but
they contribute to its unpopuIarity and de-
feat Secretary Rusk is quoted as saying
that ''this Mower and Reaper Trust will
cost the Republican party hundreds of thou
sands of votes at the next Presidential cleo
tion." He might have gone further and
said that the presence of trusts among the
protected industries contributed more than
any other one cause to the reverse of the
last election. The Republican party has
but one way OF ridding itself of that incu-
bus, and that is to provide for placing all
products controlled by such combinations
on the free list during the duration of the
trust.
But it is worth while to recognize that,
on the statement of this case, the natural
laws of trade will work out the relief of the
farmers from any exactions on the part of
the combination. While the patents last,
which are necessary to the construction OF
machines, the combination can prevent new
competition; but when the patents expire
the power to maintain high prices will soon
defeat itsel-. Not only can any man buy
the iron, steel and lumber necessary to make
mowers and reapers, but the fact that the
combination sustained prices above the
average margin of pront fixed by compe-
tition will offer the greatest stimulus on the
building of competing factories. II this
monopoly makes the business of manufactur-
ing such machines profitable we may expect
to see new factories spring up with the
greatest rapidity until the combination falls
to pieces of its own weight.
This will of course be a process of some
years; and in the meantime it is worth while
to note that these combinations are doing
more to defeat protection than any other
single cause can do.