The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-05-01

Cuban treaty which today is matter
of serious controversy. Burrows can
be counted upon to stand for anything
the beet sugar interests want, no mat
ter what prices to the consumer may
result. just appointed to the Commit
tee on Finance is Senator Reed Smoot
of Utah, where the beet sugar industry
is managed by the Mormon church and
controlled by the American Sugar Re
filming Company; and the prices at
which farmers must sell and consumers
must buy is dictated absolutely by the
owners of the factories.
The concession of five one hundredths
of a cent ON refined sugar, made by
the Payne bill and so far retained by
the Senate, while ostensibly a blow to
the sugar trust amounts to little when
it is considered that the all beet sugar
factories of the sugar trust are still
protected to the extent of 100 cents
pound. Practical sugar men contend
that no further increase of the raw
sugar duties could be made without
decreasing consumption and so impair
ing revenue. Foreign sugar means
Cuban sugar and little else; and al
though Cuban sugar at the present mo-
ment is selling at fair prices, owing
to temporary speculative conditions, 1t
could stand no more burden than it is
now compelled to bear through present
heavy duties.
The beet sugar men have been en-
Outraged by high duties for a dozen
years on their plea that if the rate
was high enough, they could supply the
entire domestic demand. This ex-
travagant protection has been based
not upon the normal requirements of
sections naturally favorable to beet
sugar production, like Colorado and
Utah, but on the unnatural conditions
obtaining in states like Michigan,
where the industry never should have
been established, Prof. Taussig boldly
told the Ways and Means Committee.
In the same hearing Representative
Fordney took the ground that the con-
sumner did not get the benefit of the
twenty per cent. reduction IN sugar
quoted by the Cuban treaty. Meantime
he has changed ground. In his speech
in Congress on the tariff bill March
81. Mr.. Fordney quoted as a reason
WHY the duties should be maintained
or increased the fact that Cuban sugars
had ranged half cent pound below
the world s price, and that the con-
sumers in the United States were bene-
filing to that extent 1t was in this
speech that Mr. Fordney told the hith-
erto undiscovered story of an alleged
compact with President Taft whereby
the sugar duties were to be maintained
if the beet sugar interests would allow
the free admission to 100000 tons OF
Philippine sugar. Said Mr.. Fordney
speaking for the beet sugar people:
'sOur present good President, Mr.. Taft,
has agreed in my presence that during
his administration he viii not permit,
as far as he can avoid by his action,
any further reduction in the sugar
schedule, if we will accept this agree
ment and let the 100000 tons come in
free from the Philippines. This is
very serious charge to be made by a
Republican against Republican presi
dent, for the tariff increases the price
of sugar to American consumers about
one hundred million dollars year, of
which one-haif goes to the U. S. Treas
ury and the other half to the domestic
producers.
During the last half a dozen years
the average ad valorem vote of the pro-
lection on raw sugars has ranged from
sixty to seventy per cent. according
to the fuctuation Of foreign values.