Waterbury Democrat., 1902-04-09
THE BEEF TRUST.

The rise in the price of meat at the dictation of ''the big five" brings the working of the trust principle right home to the masses
 They don't perceive that they are di- rectly affected by the copper trust or the steel trust or transportation trusts like the attempted Northern Securities company. When the workingman or his wife however, goes out with slen- der purse to buy piece of beef and is compelled to pay the highest price ever known--or 20 without well, there is an object lesson.
 As described in the Herald of yes, terday. four CT five large firms con- trol practically the whole of the trade, which aggregataes about six hundred million dollars a year. From the cat tie in the western stockyards to the distributing meat depots in this and other cities they are masters of ihe situation.
 The ranchman finds no competing buyers for his stock-there is the fixed price and he must take it. Controlling this vast business this giant combine can ''shOp" among the railways and get rates that preclude any pigmy rivalry. When the products reach this city there is, if possible, less opportunity for any competition. The Herald of this morning tells of the Central office through which all the firms in the com bination fix common prices and ar- range the credits to be extended to the commission butchers and the retailers managing the whole business as if controlled by one man.
 As a matter of fact, from the cattle upon the western ranch to the selling of beefsteak in a Sixth avenue shop these concerns have a monopoly. The local butchers in fact have become practically agents selling the trusts meats on commission. A few years ago, when sharp squeeze in prices elicited q strong protest from the con- sumers and dealers in New York, the combine threatened to open shops in every part of the city, retail its prod ucts and drive the butchers out of bus mess. Elsewhere, if we are not mis- taken, this was actually done. At any rate. the control of the supply at it's source gives the combination a terrible power to enforce it's terms and keep it's dealers ill absolute subjection.
 With the cheapening of transporta- ton by land and sea and the improve ment of refrigerating facilities, the markets of Europe have been opened to fresh meats from this country, and the demand thus increased, without corresponding increase of supply ena- bles those in control of the trade to exact higher prices from the domestic consumer. Regardless of the cost of transportation, American beef was sell ing in London yesterday at the same price as in New York, and ordinarily it Is somewhat cheaper. In the last fis- cal year we shipped to Europe three hundred and fifty-two million pounds of fresh beef, valued at thirty-two mil- lion dollars, and four hundred and ffftv-nine thousand cattle, valued at $37,500,000. Very nearly all of this
 beef. both dressed and lon the hoof,' went to the United Kingdom. so that "Old England's roast beef' is now very largely obtained from the Chicago pocking trust
 Under the great railway and indus- trial corporations. which are the sub- ject of so much legislation and litiga- tion this meat combination. covering the country with it's network of per fected organization. presents no formal consolidation. Messrs Swift. Armour ct al have merely "a gentlemen's agreement like that into which MT Morgan broughtrthe anthracite coal magnates many years ago. Just how they can be reached is not very clear. but some means must be devised for the virtual monopoly of an absolute necessary of life is intolerable.- New York Herald.