Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 March 1891 — KILLING AN INDUSTRY. [ARTICLE]

KILLING AN INDUSTRY.

EFFECT OF THE M’KINLEY LAW ON MOLASSES BOILING. Philadelphia Molasses Boilers In Danger— Chartering a Line of Steamers—A Lost Which Will Be the Country’s Cain. There is one American industry which «ays that it will be killed by the McKinley law. This is molasses boiling. 'The boilers are located principally in Philadelphia, where they have a capital of -$3, 000,000,000 invested. Their method ■of operation has been to import a low ■grade of molasses from Cuba, on which the dyty was six cents a gallon. From each gallon six pounds of raw sugar is produced, the duty on which, if imported directly, would be sixteen cents and a fraction. This gave a saving of ten -cents a gallon in tariff taxes to the boilers and enabled them to do business at -a profit. The residue left from boiling was also sold to the manufacturers of rum.. thus Still further enhancing the profit. Now, however, sugar goes on the free list, aijd the Philadelphia boilers will be placed' in a very bad position. The cheap raw sugar of Cuba will come into the country free, provided President Harrison will permit it* and the boilers will be put to their trumps to compete with it Furthermore; it is stated that next year the importers in Cuba, who have been buying largely of American machinery, will do their own work by boiling on the plantations, and thus save not only transportation to the shipboard but stevedoring, and leave the plants in Philadelphia without any work at all to do. Under these circumstances the boilers say that when the new law goes into effect their profits are gone, and that their $3,000,000 plants are also gone. However, they mean to die game. They have-chartered a whole line of steamers and sailing vessels to transport molasses from Cuba to Philadelphia by the tank system, thus laying it down in Philadelphia at a freight cost of two cents a gallon. But if the McKinley law kills the molasses boiling industry, that will not necessarily add anything to the bad record of that bad measure. On the contrary, by showing that we can get along without boiling Cuban molasses, it will prove that we may even gain by losing an industry. If the Philadelphia boilers are compelled to retire from business be because of the “flood” of cheap sugar coming into the country; but this cheap sugar is precisely the thing we want. It Is not the production of cheap sugar that is necessary for us, it is the cheap sugar itself that we want. The possession and enjoyment of commodities is the end and aim of all labor. Why, then, should we lament the loss of an industry when the product of thatrindustry is to be put down to us at a lower cost? Lower cost means less labor. But why not get commodities from foreign countries at less labor cost when making these commodities at home involves greater labor? This is the problem presented in every article of the tariff law which is protective. The final cost of any commodity to the country is the cost to the consumer. How much labour must a farmer on the plains perform in order to get a barrel of sugar? That is a greater question than the interests of the Philadelphia boilers or the Louisiana sugar farmers, for there are a thousand consumers of sugar to one producer. If the McKinley law, therefore, closes out every molasses-boiling establishment in Philadelphia, by giving us free sugar, it will do a good service to the country by showing that it is sometimes cheaper to kill off a home industry in order to get a cheaper and better product in a foreign country. It is a violent remedy, but it is worth trying, in order to show the people conclusively that the tariff is a tax, and that there are some industries which exist by drawing this tariff from the pockets of the consumers. If the McKinley law does this it will perform at least one excellent service.