Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 May 1891 — A Window-Glass Trust. [ARTICLE]

A Window-Glass Trust.

There was talk of the formation of a window-gla;s trust last fall during tho campaign. At that time Secretary Foster, who is largely interested in the manufacture of window-glass, was reported to be opposed to tho formation, being then a candidate for Congress. One or more of the other large manufacturers held out against the trust proposal, and the scheme came to nothing then. The talk about a trust has again been revived, and now the trust is considered much more probable. The New York Oil, Paint arid Drug Reporter, which is an organ of the glass trade, has recently pointed out how the difficulties formerly encountered have nnstly disappeared, and then continues: “Another deterring cause has been removed by tho appointment of Mr. Charles Foster to tho Treasury portfolio in the President’s Cabinet. Mr. Foster controls large glass manufacturing Intel ests and at the same time is prominently identified with politics. He was a candidate for Congress when the subject of a consolidation of glass interests was first mooted, and the public outcry against trusts made him at once an enemy of the scheme, because to bo connected with such a movement at tho time might have ruined his chances of political preferment. As he is now placed in a position where condemnation of commercial combinations by the public —under mistaken impressions or otherwise—is likely to do him and bis political aspirations no damage, his co-operation, at least, in the scheme may be expected ” The same journal points out that one of the leading manufacturers has recently put up prices 20 per cent. Such is the working of the high McKinley protection on glass. Trusts and higher prices are the order of the day.