Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 February 1893 — The New Pia e-Glnss Trust. [ARTICLE]

The New Pia e-Glnss Trust.

The form of trust adiopted by’the manufacturers of plate glass on the last day of the old year >closely resembles that which has been used for some years by the manufacturers of steel rails, and it may be noticed that the number of factories is very nearly the same in both of these industries. There are eleven plate-glass factories, and three of these are controlled by one company. The nine companies or firms which own these eleven factories have combined by appointing an agent or commissioner who will sell all the glass iproduced by them and distribute orders among the producers. These orders will be apportioned according to the productive capacity of the several factories. The commissioner will not only regulate production but also maintain a uniform price. In this way competition both im production and in prices is suppressed. This is not the first attempt to make a combination in this industry. Ear some years the manufacturers have been experimenting with combination agreements of one kind aod another. A few weeks after the enactment of the McKinley tariff the New York Tribune directed attention to these practices in the following telegram: Pittsburg. Dec. 25. A meeting of the manufacturers and jobbers ot the plateglass trade will be held In this city In the near future. At the recent New York meeting it was decided to advance prices HU per. cent, but since then Western men have made a stand for a 25 per cent, advance. the avowed Intention of the fraternal combination is to keep plate-glass prices at the highest llgure possible, and at the same time keep them low enough to shut out all Importations

TtoiS'Object can be attained more surely by the plan now adopted than by the verbal promises of the manufacturers. When all orders must be addressed to one Commissioner, who is bound to exact a uniform price, there will be no roam for variations and secret underselling. The leading manufacturer recently said that the domestic product had come to be 90 per cent, of the entire supply. The fact that 10 percent, of the supply, if that be a correct estimate, is still imported in spite-of very high tariff duties indicates that by means of, combination agreements the selling price of domestic plate glass has been maintained far above a normal level. This may also he indicated by the large profits of the industry. The leading company paid a dividend of 34f per cent, in 1889, and the new tariff has made ithe importation of plate glass more (difficult in the last two years, although the specific duties on the leading sizes were not changed. The duties on the two specified sizes larger than 24 by 30 inches are 25 and 50 fflents a square foot, respectively, and these were equal in 1891 to 66 per oent. in the first case and 105 J per cent, in the other. Such are the imposts under the shelter of which the manufacturers combine to exact ring prices from the people who gave them ithe “protection” which they abuse. It was supposed that by means of the Federal anti-trust law the people cculd reach these unlawful associations, but the affiliation of the Harrison administrations have prevented the enforcement of the new law. The combination of plate-glass manufacturers amd many other combinations will o©.t be overlooked,, however, in the coming revision of the tariff.— New York Times.