The Washington times., 1909-03-31
THE SUGAR TARIFF AND THE
COST OF LIVING.


uIes of the Payne tariff bill, with spe-
cial reference TO the relation they will
have to the cost of living if this bill
shall become law. Today the subject
OF sugar is given some attention.
There has never been a tariff making
season when so little was heard of
sugar, as now The lumber lobby is
here in splendid force, to fght-sO it
says-for the life OF its industry. The
cattle raisers have a lobby working to
save the duty on hides. The glove
making interest has gotten in its work
most effectively. The coffee speculation
of the Brazilian state of Sac Paulo has
been influential enough, through its
connections in financial New York, to
turn a big trick The brewing indus
try has succeeded in saving itself, thus
far, from increase of. its share in the
national revenue producing scheme.
All these and hundreds of other in
terests have been active in the extreme.
But there is one great and artful lobby
missing. 1t is the sugar lobby.
Why is the sugar lobby missed?
Because it is getting everything it
wants IN this bill
Because, apparently, it is supremely
confident that it need make no effort.
1t knows it is cared for in the House
bill. and it Is somehow assured that the
Senate will not interfere with it.
Sugar is used by everybody. Liter
ally, the babies cry for it, and every
body must have it. And it is a SPLEEN
did BURDEN bearer, under the tariff
schemes that have prevailed in this
country, and that seem guaranteed per-
petuation if the Payne bill shall pass.
Sugar paid in one year, of duty, at the
ports of this country, S52,232,O4I. The
ancient theory that the foreigner pays
the tax has never been applied with
much conviction to sugar. 1t is too
easy to show what sugar costs in this
ard other countries, and to prove that
the consumer pays the tax
1t appears that the average price Of
sugar, wholesale, in 1908, was as fol-
lows:
Cents
per 10
London wholesale market .....2 .70
New York wholesale market. ....-4.96
That is, sugar cost pretty nearly
twice as much in New York's whole
sale market as in London's.
What makes up that difference? If
the sugar imported into this country
had cost only as much as sugar cost in
london, the total imports for the year
would have been northumberland
price-SIOO.6II.I Instead, at the
average figure for the year, it was
$lSl,l25,523.
That leaves a difference of $S0,5l4, 365
which somehow came out of the con
sumer. What did he get in return for
that big contribution?
First, he contributed S52,232,O4l TO
the revenues Of the country. The bal
anee went to the Sugar trust.
The Sugar trust Is the typical trust
supported by the tariff 1t is not a
great home industry. Its actual manu-
facture Of sugar in this country is I'M
important. 1t is interested in the beet
sugar development of the West, but it
Is common knowledge that it maintains
this interest, not for the sake Of devel-
opment, but for the sake of protection
by suppression. Beet sugar must not
be allowed TO grow into a big enough
INDUSTRY to menace the trusts refining
monopoly. So the trust goes into beet
sugar, and makes sure that competition
shall not be TOO serious. Then it de.
1rands protection for the beet sugar in
6nstry which it controls for the pur-
pose mainly OF suppression-and gets
II!
Let us see what our protection Of
Sugar has done for the country. II
adds SSO,OOO,O0O a year 70 the cost 1t
transfers to Great Britain the immense
industry OF making jellies, preserves,
Jams, and other articles OF which cheap
sugar is the basis, because England has
the cheap sugar. IT makes the Sugar
trust possible and powerful. II induces
the Sugar trust TO 60 into beet sugar
and stine that industry while pretend
ing to promote it. 1t enables the Sugar
trust TO earn dividends which in a sin
gle year have been as high as % per
cent, and to accumulate a surplus, after
paying immense dividends from the be-
ginning, OF So many millions that the
trust has not been making annual
statements for publication for many
years, and the statements it permits to
get TO the public are merely jumbles of
figures that serve only the vague pur-
lose Of letting the country knowJwhat