The Washington times., 1909-04-20
OPPORTUNITY FOR REAL RE
VISION. MOI.

This newspaper has heretofore had
something to say about the tariff on
sugar; and it is going to have a good
deal more to say hereafter, apropos of
the present revision of schedules.
There is no place in the whole fabric
of customs duties where more pressing
need is apparent for intelligent, sincere,
and effective revision.
Here is statement in the fewest
words of what the sugar tariff does to
the people of the United States:
The average wholesale price of sugar
in London, for 1908, was 2.7O cents per
pound.
The average wholesale price of sugar
in the New York market for 1908 was
4.96 cents per pound.
These are figures of the Bureau of
Statistics.
The average consumption of sugar
per capita in the United States is about
eighty pounds per annum.
That means that over six billion
pounds of sugar is used per annum in
the country.
The difference between the London
and the New York wholesale price is
l.s9 cents per pound Applied to six
billion pounds the result is: 5000. OOO.-
OO0xS.0ls9 equals Sll3, 400, 600
That represents the excess which the
American pays for his sugar over what
he would pay if he got the British
price.
Who gets that sll3,4OO,0OO?
First, the Government gets about
e53,O00O00 in customs duties.
After that the balance goes to the
makers of cane sugar and beet sugar in
this country, and to the refners, in this
country, of foreign and domestic sugar.
The refners get the lions share of
TINS huge balance. They get it be-
cause Of the adjustment of the tariff,
making the importation of refined
sugar impossible.
There is a matter of S6O,OOO.oOO to
be accounted for after deducting the
revenue paid to the Government; that
is, S60,OOoO0O which the American con-
sumner pays in excess of British prices.
He gets, for that s6O,0OO,OOO of ex-
cessive. payment, the vague and uncer-
tain hope that he has helped the beet
sugar industry and given a lift to the
Louisiana cane sugar business.
He has been hearing for a good many
years now that by thus encoura piup
the beet sugar business he was going
TO be able in time to get all his sugar
from American producers and smash
the Refining trust.
But he has misgivings when he turns
20 the annual report Of the Sugar trust
and learns that it owns sos. 600 900 of
the stocks of beet sugar concerns.
He is beginning to wonder whether
the beet sugar industry is a real and
worthy enterprise, OF a stalking horse
for the trust
And he can't find out which it is.
He knows that the Sugar trust
makes bloated profits and after paving
enormous dividends has a dropsicaI
surplus invested in the concerns that
were originally expected to be its com
petitors; and naturally, he conceives
misgivings about the tariff on sugar
and the present adjustment of the diff
ferential between crude and refined
sugar.
He wonders whether he is the victim
of a confidence game in this whole bust
ness.
1t is time for somebody to wake up
and insist on an airing of this sugar
business. There are people in this
country who know sugar, and are in
dependent enough TO tell the facts
about it. There is no insoluble mvs-
terry about Dutch Standard, polariscope
test, differentials, and the like. But
there is altogether too much privacy
about the information. The public is
entitled to it; Congress is entitled to
It; and the sugar schedule of the new
tariff law ought 20 be based on It, not
on the representations made by the
Sugar trust agents through the me
diumship of smooth gentlemen who
claim 70 represent beet sugar.
Let the sugar schedules be aired.