The San Francisco call., 1897-12-22
Secretary Snow Says Conditions
in This Country Favor the
New Industry.
ENCOURAGEMENT NEEDED.
Present Reciprocity Law Is Unjust
and Only Benefits the Hawaiian
Planters.
Special Dispatch to The Call

CHICAGO, Dec. 21.-B. W. Snow, one
of the editors of the Orange Judd
Farmer, and secretary Of the Amer
lean Sugar Growers Society, an or
ganization national in character which
is encouraging the growing of sugar
beets with a view to ultimate independ-
ence Of foreign sugar, says that the
greatest danger now threatening this
promising industry is the proposed an
nexation of the Hawaiian Islands. He
says: I'm the past eighteen months
our society, which is voluntary or
ganization, made up of men interested
in the development of the American
sugar industry, and whose officers
serve without other reward than the
knowledge of the great benefits which
will accrue to American agriculture,
has organized local branches in more
than half the States of the Union.
Through these local organizations we
have distributed literature and sugar
beet seed, and encouraged the expert
mental growth of beets with a view
of determining localities in which the
soil and climatic conditions are most
suitable to the successful establishment
of sugar factories. Every well posted
possessed every requisite for the pro-
duction Of beet sugar, but the recent
rural dissatisfaction with the low
prices Of staple farm products gave
exactly the conditions needed to dis
pose farmers to experiment with a crop
with which they were not familiar. The
difficulty in introducing a new crop is
to overcome the conservative inertia of
a rural population but hard facts Of
non-remunerative toll disposed the
farmers to listen at this time.
I have knowledge Of experimental
beet plats this year from Massachu-
setts to Oregon, and am assured that
more than 100000 men have engaged
in local tests this season. The rates of
yield and chemical analysis have been
remarkably favorable, and farmers of
thousand localities are now prepared
to demonstrate by actual experience
that capital can be prontably invested
in the sugar industry in each of these
communities. Farmers of the country
have done their share In demonstrating
that America can produce her own
sugar and keep at home the S1OO. 900 900
she now sends abroad each year. The
question now rests with capitalists who
can safely enter the business if pres
ent conditions are not radically dis
turbed
1T is at this point that the present
agitation for the annexation of Ha-
wall becomes a disturbing factor.
With the Chinese and Japanese con-
tract labor with which the islands are
now flooded, and which has been
largely increased in preparation for
annexation. planters of Hawaii can
produce sugar at less cost than our
beet-growers while they are learning
the business. Ultimately we can raise
it as cheaply, but it is the history of
every new industry that in the begin
ming it must be fostered and protect
ed from old established competition,
especially when that competition, as
in the present case, involves the use
of lowpriced, uncivilized labor.
"If Hawaii is annexed 1t means that
the present promise for an American
sugar industry will be blasted and our
farmers robbed Of a new, paying in
dustry, must go on raising their old
staples at unremunerative prices in
order that a limited number of cane
planters, few of them Americans. NAV
amass further wealth by the employ
ment Of coolie labor
Instead Of reaching out 2000 miles
to perpetuate competition from
which our own agriculture will be the
sufferer, the American farmer de-
mands that the present reciprocity
treaty with Hawaii be abrogated. 1t
is in no sense reciprocal. We each
year furnish a market for four times
as much as we are able to sell to the
islands. and with an annual deficit
staring us in the face we remit duties
on $50. 900 pounds of sugar with no
other result than the enriching of a
handful OF Hawaiian planters. With
our own farmers burdened by unre-
munerative toll it is monumental folly
to continue such jug-handled recipro-
city and sheer madness to consider a
scheme which will perpetually debar
us from entering new and ultimately
profitable fields of rural industry.
Our rural population knows its
needs and its rights. 1t is awake to
the situation and demands that the
interest of the American farmer be
placed before the interest of a hand
full of alien planters. Charity begins
at home, and it will go hard with a
Congressional Representative elected
by farmer votes who sacrifices his
constituents upon any plea whatso-
ever. The issue is an American sugar
industry versus Hawaiian planters.
and that issue cannot be obscured by
the frantic waving OF Old Glory and
flamboyant appeals to national
pride"
oru1rna uo1n .un -