The Minneapolis journal. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn.) 1888-1939, 1902-12-23
SUBSCRIPTIONS TERMS
Diminishing the Small Producer.

B Diminishing the Small Producer.
Have you been too busy trying to buy
800 worth of Christmas presents with $50
to notice the annexation Of the Union
Steel company by. the steel trust? If you
have. take a few minutes off and con-.
slider it.
r The Union Steel company was one of
the most powerful. perhaps the most, of
the steel companies that, for one reason
or another. were not earlier taken into
the trust. 1t was recently made up OF
two formerly separate companies, the Union
Steel company and the Sharon. Steel COM
pany. The combination owns blast fur
naces, steel furnaces, both Bessener and
open hearth. mills for the manufacture
of bars, sheets, wire. nails, tinplate, and
all the other forms Of steel. In every
way 1t was Independent of the trust. 1t
had thousands Of acres of fuel coal and
coking coal, large areas Of limestone
properties and bountiful iron mines on the
Mesaba range in this state. Moreover,
it had it's own lake fleet and other facili
ties for handling the raw materials of
teel-making. 1t could probably produce
steel as CHedply as tHe tTuSt lISeA, duu
could have waged a long and costly trade
war with the latter, had 1t come to
question Of hostilities. But where COM
petition exists combination Is probabl
nowadays, and while the iron and steel
news experts were still specializing on
what the Union company would do, the
trust opened it's jaws. swallowed. and, 10,
there was no more Union company.
! For all it's properties, located at Sha-
ron, Pa. and Pittsburg, the stockholders
Of the Union Steel company receive $45.-
100000 in per cent guaranteed United
States Steel company bonds, though
they must advance some 900 cash
to complete the immense improvements
and additions to their plants already under
way when they were annexed.
/ 1t is conjectured that the Union COM
pany is only the first mouthful for the
trust, and that it will now proceed to de-
YOUR other steel companies, including
some that have not yet begun opera TONS
This transaction and others probably
pending. may we'll cause us to doubt the
adequacy of the theory that has so much
conlforted during these trust-making
(. times, that eventually competition would
again assert itself and bring forth a brood
; of husky industrial youngsters that would
cripple, If not STAY. the octopus. The
Youngsters are born all right, but the
trust gets them and brings them up in
the way they should follow To start
new industry with sufficient capital is, if
! 1t be an economically located establish
ment, merely to create one more strong
hold for the. trust. Before it's wheels be-
gin to turn, along comes the trust and
offers guaranteed bonds at liberal rates
/ in return for the borning plant. The stock
/ holders, who are in business for returns
accept. and one more hope Of COMPETE
!, ton is gone; the trust has one more point
of support and monopoly is more firmly
. intrenched than ever. If the new plant
is economically established, it will make
money for the trust; If it is not, the trust
doesn't want it. because it knows. that
! 1t cannot be a dangerous , competitor
Consequently the extension Of the trust
. in this way seems to be financially sound
and not weakening process. The United
States strengthens rather than weakens
itself when it admits a new state and
the trust if 1t exercise due care, in adj
uniting new companies. strengthens itself
Verify, the coils of monopoly draw closer
for all our wise theories about their dis
solution.
In view Of these facts. there is some
thing delicious about the New York Posts
irony concerning the small producer"
who was SO much talked about by Presi-
I dent Roosevelt and others last summer
when the tariff controversy was raging
around the iron and steel duties. We
were warned that to reduce the duties
would be to ruin the small producer; Who
we were told-psrhaps we ourselves par
@ticipated in the telling-would be ruined
by lower duties, while his great rival
could stand them and would monopolize
the field completely over the small pro-
-ducer's dead body, as 1t were. But we
ENORMOUSLY assumed that the trust would
not of it's own motion destroy the small
producer. How simple we were! Where
fore let us return to the good Iowa doc
trine Of knocking the tar out of every
tariff schedule that shelter monopoly.