Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1891-10-01

s15S, S22, 2l2 of which is directly tracear
BILE 10 the effect of the tariff. Accord.
ing TO Blaine, their profits were $780,
100000. Had il not been for the tariff,
these profits would have been less than
Bliss, ,s22, 2l2, which would have left their
profits S97, OOO, OOO, on capital of S20,-
BOO, 900, or 3SH per cent. on the money
Invested. But as it was, their profits
were $3.50. 0OO, 900, over n per cent on
the capital invested
The facts which were brought to the
attention of the public, by litigation
brought before the orphans court OF
Pennsylvania, in regard to the estate of
]. Edgar Thomson, large steel rail
manufacturer show, in a very tangible
and precise form, the profits that have
been realized by the steel rail manufac-
tories in which Mr.. Thomson was a
stookholder, and showed that there
had been several years during the dec
ade of 1S7O-'SO in which the profits
amounted to n per cent. Take the
year 1880: There were produced in the
United States S51, 700 tons of steel rails
and the average difference in price of
American over English rails was S27. so
a ton; multiply the number of tons pro-
duced by the average difference in price
occasioned by the duty, and you have
the enormous sum of S2S, 421, $50 re-
ceived above the English price by the
American rail makers, by means of the
duty collected from the people-S2S 421,-
75O-on the pretense that it
was needed to cover the diff
ference between the wages paid
by them and their English COM
petitors. But the whole wages paid by
the American makers to their workmen
in this same year, amounted to only
e4, 9S4, 329. That is to say, they collect
cd from the people, by reason of
the duty, S1s 4S7, ,425 more in that
year than they paid to their laborers.
And yet we expected to believe that
this duty was paid by the people, not
at all for the benefit of the manufact-
urers, but solely for the benefit of the
laborers. Had the people paid the la
borers employed double the amount of
wages they actually received, and al
! lowed them to live life of idleness and
ease, and paid the manufacturers per
cent. interest on the capital invested,
they would have saved in that year by
the operation S13 333, O92, and would have
been able to have bought their rails at
S27. SO per ton cheaper.
Now, who is it that has paid the in
crease in price of $153, S22, 212? Of
course the railroad companies paid it in
the first instance. But / am persuaded
to believe that if the companies were
relieved from this tribute they are now
compelled to pay, they would give such
rates as even the Farmers alliance peo-
pie never dreamed Of The duty on
rails increases the cost of railroad build
ing about S3, 900 per mile, and the divi.
dend on this, of course, has to be paid,
in the second instance, by merchants
farmers and others, who are compelled
to pay high rates of freight for the
transportation of their merchandise and
crops. This being a wheat growing
and manufacturing state, the farmers
and manufacturers are especially in
jured by this class of duties.
Gov. Gear, of Iowa, a republican rev.
enue reformer, in his inaugural address,
in speaking of the question, said: ITO
a state whose products are in the main
agricultural, as are those of Iowa, any
thing which enhances the cost of rail-
ways, thereby even incidentally, in the
least degree, increasing the expense of
transportation of her products to the
seaboard, which is great market, is a
question of interest to all In view of
their greater strength and dura bility,
which lessons the cost of replacement,
all the great trunk railway lines of the
country are adopting Bessemer steel
rails The manufacture of this class of
rails in the United States is controlled
by com bination of not exceeding,
think, ten firms in number. This COM
bination is protected by high spe-
cific tariff, which prevents the importa-
tion of foreign rails to any extent
thereby increasing the cost of railways
of the country Without discussing the
tariff question in all it's bearings, it
legislation, by tariff exceptional in it's
character, to put immense profits into
the pockets of monopoly, composed of
but few persons, at the expense indi-
rectly, not only of the Iowa farmers,
but of the whole west"
Senator Grimes, Iowas greatest re-.
publican senator, and once governor of
that state, &aid:
SIT is enough to make the devil laugh
with glee to see the farmers voting to
support high tariff, which doubles the
cost of railroad iron, spikes chairs, To-
comotives, tenders, cars, etc, the effect
OF h;ch is to double the cost of trans
p. IN of all the produce, and what
til, oonsume, and then hear them
gron about the high rates of passage
and freight, not for moment reflect
ing that they, by their votes, impose
these high rates of freight on them
selves"
Second. So far as the laborers are
concerned, what has been the effect of
the duty? In 1870 the average annual
wages paid to the laborers in the iron
and steel industries of all kinds, was
$45426. During the year 1870 the tariff
on steel rails was doubled. After ten
years of this high tariff the average
wages, according to the census reports
of 1880, was only $685. a decline Of
800. rs, or 1875 per cent, and in 1884,
according to Bradstreet, there was a
further decline of 30 per cent, making
total of declines since 1870 of 33H per
cent And yet this steel rail monopoly,
this association of eleven companies,
made close corporation by paying so
much money per ton into Jackpot,
and in 1S77-7S they paid one of their
number, the Vulcan steel rail rolling
!