Evening journal., 1896-11-27
CONTEMPORARY OPINION.
AMERICAN EXPORT MANUFAC-
TURES.


The details Of exports of manufac-
lures for the current year. as COM
piled by the statisticians of the Treas
ury Department, indicate steady
growth in the productive powers and
competing capacity of American in
dustrial enterprises. During the first
quarter of the current fiscal year these
exports have exceeded $64 100000 in
value. or at n yearly average of about
$500 600 600. The Increase has amount
ed to nearly 100000. 600 since 1890;
while the percentage relation to the
total amount Of our exports has in
creased within the same period of
time from rs per cent. to 2G1a per cent.
This relative advance in value, it is
believed in Treasury circles, will
be maintained during the current year,
Notwithstanding the notable advance
I'm the prices of our agricultural pro-
ducts i'm foreign markets.
Among the articles classified by the
Treasury statisticians as manufactured
goods, it has always been the custom
of the department to include copper
ingots and refined mineral oil. While
the latter commodity is clearly entit-
led to rank as aproduct Of skilled in
dustry the classification OF copper in
gots as manufactured goods has been
criticised in some quarters as palpa-
BILE perversion of facts. These ingots
are merely the raw material which
foreign artisans employ In the con
struction of the multitudinous modern
devices suggested and required by the
rapid devlopment of electrical engi-
ncering science. There is no good rea-
son why the smelted product of our
copper mines should be listed in Off
cial statistics as manufactured goods
unless a misleading eXaggeration of
the sumtotal of exports of such goods
should be deemed desirable by official
authority.
Aside from these two confusing ele-
ments, however, it is evident that nu-
merous additional channels have beer
/ opened i'm recent years for the outflow
/ of products of American skill and in
genuity. In some of the more recently
developed branches of industrial pro
duction-as. for example, the manufac
/ ture of bicycles and typewriting ma
chinos-the advantages enjoyed b.
American manufacturers in interna
/ tional competition have been 81
marked that the increased traffic ha
been given a separate rating and col
umn by the Treasury statistical eX
perts. Thus, the exports of bicycle
for nine monthsof the current calenda
year amount i'm value to $2,SO0,OOO
and this i'm an industry which thre
years ago was unknown, so far as eX
ports to foreign countries are con
cerned In short, the marked increas
Of manufactured exports from tn
country i'm recent years has been con
fined largely to shipments Of fine ma
chinery, rare and ingenious product
. of mechanical ingenuity, labOr-savin
. contrivances of general use and appl
cation; appliances for the cOnstructio
of which the material is abundant an
easily accessible, as i'm manufacture
of wood. and original inventions c
worldwide utility, which can be mad
as cheaply here as elsewhere
I'm these broad and remuneratiy
fields from which staple manufacture
are largely excluded, the position {
Z American industry is becoming yea
by year more prosperous and less sui
iect to undue disturbances from ou
i. side competition.-New News.