New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1891-06-08

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they exist only for this market, they are selling
their product here at O price greatly in excess
of its fair value. and the chief argument OF those
American metal-workers who desired Congress to
increase the tin plate duty so that they could man-
facture here was that they would be able. not
withstandng their increased expense in wages,
TO sell at even lower rates than the foreign product
| was bringing In the summer OF 1882 Their propo-
eition TO the American people, reduced to its sim
, plest terms was this: You are now buying $780,
! 600 tons of foreign tin-plate annually, on which
there is only revenue duty; IN 1889 you PAID
for this product, including the duties. S2S.:Sl,-
66s all that went to employ foreign labor and to
sustain foreign industry: you paid for the iron
and steel imported in those plates much more
than you paid our protected steel-workers for the
iron and steel used in domestic steel rails and
sheet steel; you received. as consumers, no bene-
| fits from the cheap labor employed in making
these plates and timing them, but they cost you
as much as if they had been made at the Amer
lean rate of wages your three-quart coifee-pot
that cost YOU % cents cost the BRITISH maker less
than IL cents; your pint tin-cups that cost you
cents cost him less than . {; your twelve-qunrt
dishpan that cost you 80 cents cost him less
than Ia; he charged the American workingman
80 cents for a dinner kettle that cost him only
~ cents and these comparisons fairly illustrate
the difference throughout the tn-plate trade be-
| tween what his goods cost him and what he got
for them from the American public we ask
YOU. then, that q high tariff be levied on his
products, and we will make such products here
we will increase the American consumption OF
American ironsore by 100000 tons annually, OF
limestone 300, 900 TONS of coal and coke 100000
TONS of pigiron 400, 600 tons, Of lead 5,5OO,OOO
tops of taow and oil 100000 pounds, Of
suphurc acid 40, 100000 pounds and of lumber
Il, 900 900 feet: we will employ $4,000 Amerl-
can workingmen, and pay them $40 100000 In
wages and we will sell you tinware cheaper than
you get it to-day; we Will do this substantially
within a period of six years from the date of the
new tariff. or, if we fail you can take the in
creased duty away; it can do you great harm
meanwhile, for the foreign tin-pate-maler Is al
ready charging YOU prices so much greater than
his expenses that he can have no honest pretcXt
for a further increase, and if he makes
further increase it will prove all the
more conclusively that we should build up
this industry at home, and subject those who sup
ply its product to that same form of competition
which has reduced the price of galvanized iron
sheets from ga cents pound in 1850 to Ia
cents in 1885, of cut nails from 50 6S per keg III
1850 to 81 60 in April, 1891, of steel rails from
SCI 25 per ton in 1850 to $40 20 in 1889, S3l 40
in 1870, while all this time, and, indeed, for ity
years, the price of tin-pate has remained at about
The same figures, So III May, 1881, % 20 IN June,
1889, So 03 in June, 1891
These were the arguments that convinced Con-
gress of the wisdom Of transforming the tln-pIatc
duty from revenue duty TO protective duty
Certainly ii the desirability of protection can
be admitted at all, it must be In these clrcum-
stances The facts being conceded, 1t is possible
TO hold with regard TO them only one OF TWO posi-
tious-eitber that the duty should be raised or
no
the European scale. The principles which Apply
here apply in all trades, and IL II Is proper 10
abandon the tin-plate industry to foreigners mercy
because, paying lower wages, they can produce
cheaper, though We who take three-fourths Oh
their produce obtain no benefit from their cheaper
production then, of course every other industry
should be abandoned for the same reason, or we
should accept the conditions Of their free com
petition and reduce our labor with our tarlI
Congress did not take the fIee-trade view. III
raised the tariff, providing that the new rates
should 60 into effect on July |, 1891, ana that
if by July l. 1897, the product of domestic plates
in any year between those dates has not equalled
one-third the amount of the plates imported in
any year between those dates, n-pate on october
| following should go on the free list Nething
could be iarer than this, and its fairness VIII be
admitted by such Free-1raders as are not essen:
TALLY incapable of seeing more than one side OF
q question. 1t simply affords American metal
workers the chance TO see what they can do. 1t
can be criticised only by those who would see
American labor where foreign labor is, or who
would prefer to have the country converted into
u
lands for every manufacture, from tooth-plck
to locomotive. =,
The new tariff has not yet gone into effect, but
already the frec-trade press is crying out with
funny air of triumph, and as If the whole con-
troversy as to our power of production under the
new law had been settled before IL has been so
much as opened that no American tin-plates are
now being made except for the purpose OF political
show. This is not true, but what II IL were !!
If the challenge thrown out by the new law is
accepted, and if the Free-1raders are willing 10
stand or fal-as certainly the PrOtectionists are
upon the issue, it can scarcely be pretended that
the time to test the laws efficacy is before IL
has gone into operation! The proper time Is
fixed in the law--on July ], 1891. If by that
time nothing has been accomplished, ProtectonlstS
will be compelled TO admit that something has
gone wrong.
They are not alarmed, however, at the prospect.
American enterprise has already accomplished a
remarkable work To make light of 1t is to be
silly to deny it is to be dishonest, and TO claim
that American skill is unequal to the task is TO
insult the most inventive and successfully indus
trial nation on the globe American TIN plates
are already selling in the open market-not In
large quantities, of course, nor In great varieties
but sufficiently to satisfy its manufacturers that
they can easily and prohtably produce at current
prices Several of the manufacturers now at work
are themselves enormous consumers of tin-plates,
fact which has stimulated them to make haste
in establishing their works. They are themselves
using their entire product and would do so were
it many times greater than il now is, but this of
does not affect the practical point that they
are commercially producing. Such establishments
are the ST. Louis Stamping Company, Norton
Brothers, of Chicago, and Somers Brothers, of
Brooklyn, all of whom are now timing plates and
building mills to roll their black plates from the
steel bars. The United States Iron and Tin Plate
Company, of Denmmler Penn, =. II. Laufman
Co.,. of Apollo; Penn, Fleming. Hamilton d :, Co.
Of Pittsburg, Marshall Brothers * Co., of Phila-
delphia, and the large importing house of n d e.
Taylor, in the same city, have all erected plants
and are now successfully producing for the open
market. That their output is small in comparison
with the countrys demand goes without saying
but in view of all the circumstances it is encour.
agingy large. To suppose that these firms, all of
whom are wealthy and long,esta6lished me metal
to crafty Mr. Mckinley and the Republican Con
gress is sheer idiocy They propose to make money.
and for that end are embarking or preparing to
embark in large expenditures Of capital for rolling
mills and timing plants. -
The work that has been done by \. 81 G.. Tay
lor who are particularly mentioned here only be-
cause of their relation 10 the tn-plate trade~as
great importers, sufficiently illustrates what each
of the other American producers has accomplished
and is making ready to accomplish. The house
of the MessrS Taylor is ninety years old, rich,