The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1912-02-28
STEEL FROM THE INSIDE.

STEEL FROM THE INSIDE.
 Stanley Steel Committee expert re- ports that
 The United States Steel Corporation operates in restraint of trade and con- trols 80 per cent. of the country's steel trade.
 It manipulates prices through the Cary Dinners"
 It eliminates competition through the control of raw materials and in- terlocking control of companies.
 J. P. Morgan & Company were -giv- en $7O,OOO, 900 in profits for promoting the trust.
 In the first nine years of it's exist ence, the trust made aggregate profits of over a billion dollars.
 Washington, Feb. 2s-That the so- called functions known as "Gary Din- ners'' control absolutely the prices in the steel industry and that the United States Steel Corporation is in restraint of trade in it's domination of raw material, were the conditions reported to the Stanley Steel Committee of the House, today, by Farqhar J. MRae, the committees expert accountant. Mc~ Rae's report was the result of de- tailed examination of the books of the steel trust made while the records were under subpoena by the commit tee. In several particulars, the re- port contradicts testimony given by officials of the trust before the com mittee.
 Gary Dinners" the report says. operate to maintain prices and exclude competition.
 "The arrangement is designed and intended so to operate, it continues. and it does so operate, as to steel rails, although it is claimd that the so-called independent companies can cut prices without fear of penalty ex- cept the dishonor of declaring in favor of a named price and then selling at some other price,"
 At the Gary Dinners, representatives of the steel corporation and indepen- dent concerns meet and agree to reduce their production conformably to their estimate of the demand ex- isting."
 "It can be no Justification of the cooperation of the participation in the Gary Dinners that no penalty at taches to a violation of the declara- tions mutually exchanged,' the report commented, "becauSe, perfOrce, the antitrust act would prevent the en- forcement of any penalty for reducing prices or exceeding one share of the business
 The report drew the conclusion that the Gary dinner agreements were in reality just as binding on steel manu- facturers as the pool agreements of the old days, which weref legislatec against by the Sherman act.
 A fabulous profit was made out of the formation of the steel trust by J r. Morgan S WHICH the combination, the report says The steel trust books showed a total of S69, 300 900 was paid the Morgan concern for financing the syndicate that or ganized the trust. Of this, S62. SOC, ,OOC was a promoters profit, while the re- maining S6,800. GOO was the profit on a { bond conversion scheme. In the first nine years of it's existence, the cor poration earned net, the report said $1, ,029, ,6S5. .3S9 instead Of $9S0, 900. 311, as is set forth in the reports of the cor poration officials. This amounts to a net profit of $13 a ton on finished steel products
 Eighty per cent. of the steel pro- ducing properties Of the country are dominated by the steel corporation, and H. c. Prick told President Roose- welt, when they absorbed the Tennes- see Coal 6, Iron Company, in 1907, that the trust controlled, and desired tC control, less than sixty per cent of the steel business. Then in making its profits, the report charges, the steel corporation restrains competi- tion by concentrating the greater part of it's profits in its operations on raw materials and semi-finished products 1 while confirming the finished produc l plants to a low profit This operates ]! according to the report, to keep the vantage of the corporation and the | detriment of independent competitors The report showed in detan the div 9dendS paid by the subsidiary compan- 1 ies Of the steel trust during the first nine years of it's existence. The to- tai amount was $753 124, ,2S6.53. The fact that the subsidiary companies oD-