Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1893-10-26
BUCCANEERS BOLD.
TRUST OPERATORS AND TRAIN ROB-
HERs COMPARED.

The Railroad Bsudit Is n DungIer and
Lands In Prison. While the Sugar Thief
WAKES Fat on tho Proceeds OF His VII
Ialny-Western Profits.
Talk about daring robberiesi Those
Indiana and Michigan bandits aren't ''in
it" at all. They are mere bungling,
slouchy novices alongside of some Of
their professional brethren who take
millions and never get caught, and who
neither wear masks nor conceal them
selves from the officers of the law.
How those IS or 90 Michigan train rob-
bers will kick themselves when they real
ize what mess they made in robbing
an express train Of only $40, 900 and then
getting caught and having to return
all of their Doodle of which they them
selves had been robbed How they must
turn green with envy when they think
of some of the successful trust operators
who. in open defiance of federal and
state laws and public opinion, hold up
not mere handful of people ON train,
but the whole American people, and
who take not merely few thousand,
which they cannot retain, but many
millions.
For instance, there is the Sugar trust.
It puts its greedy clutches into the pock-
cts of every one of the 5000, 900 or TO-
O0O, 1000 of us Americans 1856 times a year.
It picked our pockets of not less than
$25 ,000, 900 last year and is reaching for
$50 ,000, 900 this year. Observe with what
smoothness and boldness it does its work!
Going back two years, we find two
bands of sugar robbers plying their trade
in this country-one, commanded by
Havemeyer, in control of all but two or
three important refneries in the east
and of one in San Francisco; the other,
under command of Claus Spreckels, who
owned refinery in San Francisco, and
who had just completed big refinery in
Philadelphia. The territories of these
robber barons overlapped, and each
threatened to exterminate the other-but
they didn't. They "got together" The
Havemeyer band agreed to pay the
Spreckels band $1O,0O0,0OO (at least $4,.
100000 more than it was worthy for its
Philadelphia refinery and to establish q
western branch by pooling the two San
Francisco refneries, leaving Spreckels as
chief buccaneer of the Pacific coast and
joint owner with the great Havemeyel
band Of the western refneries.
The eastern end of this consolidated
robber band is doing its best, but it has
more to contend with than the western
end. 1t has the same half cent pei
pound duty, to be sure, to keep out for
eign competition, but it is only ont
week distant from Europe, and freight
are comparatively low from east K
west across the Atlantic. 1t is really
protected from the cheap sugar of Eu
rope by only three-fourths of cent pc,
pound. Under these conditions i
should congratulate itself when for an,
length of time it can flch more than
cent per pound out of the pockets of it
go .000, 200 customers. During the latte
part of August and the first part of Se'
tember it was paying 81 cents for raw
and selling standard and fine granulatet
sugars for 500 cents per pound net casl
in seven days. As the total cost of re
fning does not exceed 81 cents, this EN-
of the trust was then making more thai
, 1 cent per pound net profit. Refine
sugar could then have been imports
from Europe and sold here at a prof
for less than cents after paying duty
but importers dare not start any con
siderable quantity this way because tn
trust would take pains to drop the pric
until they had sold out at loss.
The western end of this robber trus
deserves the highest praise for its marve
GUS work. Here is what The journal c
Commerce and Commercial Bulletin c
New York said on Sept. 10:
) "But it is different in San francisco
Our last quotations from there, about
week ago, gave the price of dry granuls
. ted sugar at 81 cents net cash in rs barre
lots, and fine granulated 81 cents pc
j pound. Thus there was difference {
1.41 cents between the net prices hei
and there on dry granulated, and of IL
= cents on fine granulated, thus bringin
the profit on the western sugar trade Il
to 2.41 and 2.66 cents per pound respe
lively on the two grades, assuming thu
the cost of refining is the same in I'll
two places.
"But to this profit we must add I'll
one-quarter cent rebate secured frol
the Hawaiian planters, which thus bring
the aggregate profit per pound on IL
San Francisco business, as per list price
up to 2.66 and 2.91 cents per pound c
the grades mentioned. Even if we a
low an extra cost for refining there, VI
still will have the refners' profits of n,
less than 81 and q cents per pound r
spectively, and applying the small,
amount to the total importations Of 13C
600 short tons of raw sugar we get q
aggregate annual profit at 81 cents p
pound of $6,500,000 from the busine
done by the Western Sugar Refnir
company, the branch of the Sugar tru
in San Francisco"
At cent per pound tbs profits on Il
sugar sold in this country each year wi
be about $35, 100000. The same journ
quoted above estimated the trusts pro
its for the fiscal year ending June 8
/ 1893. at S2s, $500 clean profit on I
fning properties reported to be wort
only $20,0O0,00O. 1t says: "And the
0 are by no means all the profits Of tt
= Sugar trust. It is known as mont
lender on Wall street." 1t calls Il
0 trust "the most arbitrary monopoly Il
country ever saw or put up with" c
y Sept. 81 it was said that the Sugar tru
0 had loaned 100000 on the market ar
! that it had "heavy balances left ov'
which it was unable to loan"
Such operations, carried on in ope
daylight in every state Of the Union, pl
A. Al. H. %+a, ,@r,