The Wisconsin tobacco reporter. (Edgerton, Wis.) 1877-1950, 1907-11-01
NOTE BOOK SKETCHES


It is especially unfortunate to all
branches of the tobacco trade that the
recent financial disturbance should oc-
cur at this time of the year when ar
rangements are generally made for the
movement of stocks from the packers to
the manufacturers hands, but also for
taking over last seasons crop from grow
ers. The stringency in money centers
with the high rates of interest demanded
must act as great handicap to trading.
Manufacturers will be unable to provide
the capital necessary to lay in their
stocks for the year, as has been their
custom, but must go into the market
oftener and buy in smaller quantities
than before, as their means will warrant.
Local packers who look each year to un-
loading their holdings of one crop before
investing in another must therefore car
ry their investments longer than usual
and await the coming of the jobter and
manufacturer. The large operators,
those who move the greater share OF the
seasons crop, are generally large bor-
rowers in the financial centers, and these
too must experience the same difficulty
in securing loans as everyone else does
when stringency occurs. The ten
dency, therefore, of an unsettled busi-
mil oo fou rHC
conservative methods in the tobacco
trade. From the present outlook there
will not be much early buying of last
years crop in any of the states, for the
chief concern of the people who gener-
ally move the crop is now to dispose OF
their holdings of old leaf and release
some of the capital invested.
x*x
with farmers thoroughly organized
! in this section and prices established for
tobacco, which the dealers refuse to pay,
there is prospect of dull winter for
the Tobacco City The American So
ciety of Equity is apparently in control.
Their inspectors have graded tobacco in
l
The farmers who have joined the asso-
citation own most of the tobacco raised
| in southern Wisconsin this year. They
| are not only holding this crop for their
price, but insist that unless this crop is
Sold they will raise none next season.
The above is fair sample of several
dispatches sent out from the tobacco
sections to the city press recently. The
evident intent of these dispatches is to
| bolster up the stand taken by the grow
ers' organization for a fixed price for
their product. The writer hopes they
will be able to realize those figures, but
! it is we'll enough TO look the facts
squarely in the face. Under the present
financial conditions it is futile to force a
market for the crop at this time when SO
much of it remains uncured. Possibly
later things will shape around all right,
| but see what the cotton growers are up
against. From a St. Louis paper we
CLEAN this statement:
| "The Texas banks which have been
advancing money to planters who want
| to hold cotton so as to send the price up
| to Is cents have withdrawn their sup
port This is right. 1t was bad policy
| for them to enter upon. The country is
opposed to all sorts of cornering opera
tions. 1t is against cornering of railway
stocks, as we'll as of all farm or factory
products. Let the price of cotton as
we'll as of everything else be determined
by natural laws. Supply and demand,
| if allowed free sway, will fix prices at a
| more normal level than any coterie of
producers, backed by clique of bank
| ers, can choose
There is somewhat of a similarity be-
tween Is cent tobacco and Is cent cotton
*.x
| The latest movement in the campaign
of the government against the tobacco
| trust is sensational and unexpected. A
seizure of cigarettes to the value of
about $1,000 ia transit from the factories
of the British American Tobacco Co. to
New York has been made at Norfolk, Va.
! The "information" is to be filed at Rich.
| mond, where the owners may claim the
property and deny the charge that it be-
longs to a combination 10 restraint of
trade, presenting proof to sustain the
denial. The seizure is made under the
sixth section of the Sherman Act which
provides that 'any property owned
under any contract or by any combina-
tion or pursuant to any conspiracy"
mentioned in the first section may be
seized and condemned as in the case of
property imported into the country con-
trary to law. Apparently the object of
this step is to hurry matters along and
put the burden of proof upon the de-
PENDANTS; for the latter, of course, will
have to prove that they are not an illegal
combination before they can recover the
goods. In the course of the proceedings,
| it is believed that the government may
secure valuable information which it
may be able to use to advantage in the
bill of equity suit. On the other hand,
/ should the trust be unable to recover
/! the tobacco in question the government