The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1908-05-28

Cd plIaI Inc sugar Plantations OF t1d-
wall have a combined capitalization of
something over $4,000, 600 The owner
ship of this is divided between about
| 1000 shareholders. The control of the
sugar industry is centered in the hands
of half a dozen big companies in Ho-
noluiu. sugar factors. These companies
act as agents for the plantations, and
they are not prohibited from owning
shares in plantation stock, not by any
means. There are fourteen suga.
agents on the list. but there are six
big ones. These big companies grew
out OF small stores established many
years ago in the days when nobody
dreamed of doing business by the mil
lions.
The small sugar planters of the old
days had to have supplies for their
places. They obtained them from a
Honolulu trading store. When the crop
was made they sold their sugar to the
same store, or employed the store to
act as agent for its sale. AS the sugar
business grew from a small matter of
farming to the proportions of a mighty
industry, the factors grew with it, But
the old ways are strong, and these old
institutions can today sell you any
thing from a million dollar steamship
to a box of carpet tacks. They are
still supply stores of the general type,
waxed great and rich.
As half a dozen firms and dozen or
so men control the sugar business, they
control the business of Hawaii. They
are King Sugars ministers. Up to this
time no one of them has been charged
with disloyalty to his monarch. They
are faithful servitors. II was inevita-
BILE, of course, that the concentration
of this economic power into a few
hands would cause strife. There have
been sharp contests. there are now
and chickering's.
1t is said that a total stranger can
buy machinery or other supplies from
a sugar agent much cheaper than one
of that agents plantations can buy it.
A muck raker would undoubtedly find
some molasses on the tines of his i'm
plement if he trailed it over Hawaii.
On the other hand. the prosperity of
the islands and everybody in it has
been made by sugar, is supported by
sugar, and without sugar would perish
The sugar barons have
brought a great curse upon their land
by the Importation of an excess of
Oriental labor, perhaps, but whatever
blessings the country has they also
brought.
Politics in Hawaii is not ideally free
from corruption. IT wasn't III the old
days of the monarchy, and it isn't now.
But it is to be doubted if any state in
the Union has laws which throw as
much light into the inside workings
Of corporations as do the laws of Ha-
wall. This in spite of the fact that a
-
of the country. It is not
meant that these laws are ITtopian, or !
that they accomplish great results. It
IS merely the wonder that such pub
Lefty laws are on the statute books. |
The sugar barons apparently have
not been put to the necessity of study
ing politics. They had a bill in the
two years ago to enable
them to bring in some Portuguese and |
Spanish immigrants, badly needed to
relieve the labor situation. They did |
Mt mention il to their leader in the |
Senate and it went to the table II /
he had known it. it could have been |
passed without a word. As il was, it I
required hard work to pull it through |
On the whole. the sugar barons seem /
not TO be such bad bar0ns after all /
The community knows that they
have built its prosperity and. in a
measure, the community is grateful. /
These things may change. Some of /
he sugar barons are placing obstacles {
n the way of demonstrating and other /
Efforts toward Americanization, fearing
he effect upon their system of labor |
This attitude is antagonistic to the
moving spirit Of the territory. and
when the clash comes it viii be the /
sugar barons' heads that are cracked. /
Some Of the sugar bar0ns. especially /
he British and Germans. still believe. /
or affect to believe, that the United /
States viii again open the doors to
Asiatic immigration so far as Hawaii j
s concerned. The majority OF the /
American planters look toward the |
south of Europe for help. /
The sugar planters have problems. of ?
curse. but in Hawaii their outlook is
-osy. Just now they are glorying in
he biggest crop OF their history and
op-notch price, Even if the dreaded
hing happens and Philippine sugar. or
wen Cuban sugar. is admitted into the
United states without duty the sugar
planters may find consolation in the
'apidly increasin consumption Of SUI
sar. Thirty-f1ve years ago the sugar
'Itp q Inc %oF4u was TWO OF three lIat4-
ion tons each year, over half Of which
vas made from cane. 1t did not reach
our million tons until 1855 when for
he first time the beet sugar produc
ion was a little the larger half. The
.rop reached the ten million ton mark
n 1902, six Of which was from beets
nd four from cane.
The last annual statistics reported a
=1rid'S rra0 0F over twelve million
ons. seven from beets and FIVE from
ane. The increase Of consumption Of
ugar in the United States. as might
e expected, has been startIingIy rapid,