Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1892-09-03
TARIFFS, TRUSTS AND TRAMPs.


II Is Just as Plain That Our rarin Fro
NOTES Trusts a. THAT Drunkenness
breeds Crime.
The June supplement 81 the New
York World, edited by Hon. John De
Witt Warner, is made up OF zone hun
bred samples" of tariff trusts, under the
heading: "ConspiracicS to Crush Com
petition, Restrict Product Raise Prices
and Lower Wages These trusts em-
brace most OF the articles on which we
have effective tariff duties, Among the
| officers Of these trusts will be found
hundreds Of names published in the
New York Tribunc'S list oi millionaires,
thus in part at least, answering the
Tribuuc's question As ~ whether or not
the tariff makes m~illiouaircS. Wcquote
the following from MIR. Warmers preface
Ia these articles.
TRUSTS are a consequence Of hut
man selfShnesS working under the new
conditions Of industrial development,
Not all of them are consequences of the
tariff any more than all crime is a re-
suit Of drink 1t is just as plain, how
ever, that our tariff promotes trusts as
that drunkenness breeds crime.
For, in any industry, whose prod
uct our government protects by a
tariff upon similar articles made abroad,
it is in the power of home manufacture
ers to cNtort from Il people the full
tariff rate as a bonus for their own
pockets; whereas If it were not for the
tariff, no combines would work unless
it included the whole world. As to a
protected industry, therefore, the tariff
makes it as much easier to form trusts
than it would otherwise be, as it is
easier successfully to combine the few
manufacturers Of a single nation than
it is to get and keep together in har-
mony many times as many manufact-
urers, scattered all over the world.
Monopoly once secured, the results
are:
"FirSt-TheSc combines. covering as
they do many great branches of pro-
tected manufacture, and affecting many
others, raise the price of manufactured
goods, so that the consumer gets less
for the same amount of money. 1t is
generally the case also that a large pro-
portion Of the concerns which have
combined together are those which can
not manufacture the manufactured
goods as economically as the others.
The ordinary purse has been to pay
such a certain price for remaining idle,
leaving all Of the product to be made at
manufacturers which can produce it
most cheaply, while instead Of return
ing this benefit in cheaper goods to the
and to wage carriers in other in
du>tries, the combine keeps up the price,
not merely 10 afford cXhorbitant profit
to the plants still kept at work, but to
pay to the idle manufactures the bonus
agreed upon for their remaining non
productive.
"Second-Thc object Of a trust com
bine is to make large profit, on a linn
tied product, Ii successful, therefore,
the members Of a trust make up, by the
high rate Of their profits, what they
lose by the SnaIlnc>s OF their sales, and
they are, therefore, just as well off as
though, by selling goods more cheaply,
they made larger sales. 1t is the
amount Of goods to be manufactured,
and not the profit that the employer is
make ont of each item, that deter
mines the demand for labor and the
he must pay. y trust combine
in a protected industry is, therefore, an
arrangement by which, government
keeping out foreign competition, our
manufactures take advantage of this
fact, and, making our people pay
enough more for the few goods they
are able to buy, keeps profits as large
as they would have been from sales at
Il more reasonable price while employ
less labor and at lower wages than
otherwise, Trusts, therefore, enable
manufacturers to make the most money
by employing the least labor.
"Ihird-Ihc more closely organized
combine OF employers in any one
industry, the better able are they to con-
luer their laborers in disputes as to
or hours, OF course employers
could organize for this purpose ever
though not for the other. Late expert
ance, however, has shown, as might have
been expected, that combines, original
y formed to increase the price Of goods,
restrict production, have been the
most frequent foundation of a combine
successfully to cope with labor organ.
cations
"Bclow are given II hundred sam.
plies of tariff trusts selected from the
in existence. Three things
are SO general that they may be con-
sidercd as universal incidents of a tariff
trust-the arbitrary crushing out of
nroduct so ne to onc,ra tho biohoc.
that will NOT destroy tho Ia,