Jasper County Democrat, Volume 15, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 August 1912 — IN A FALSE POSITION [ARTICLE]

IN A FALSE POSITION

TWO STATEMENTS BY SCHWAB SEEM CONTRADICTORY. ■r- . •: . . V/; Declares Steel Tariff Must Not Be Lowered, and Talks of Victory in Market Over His European Competitors. When Charles it. Schwab returned from a trip to Italy he immediately gave out an interview saying that the tariff on steel cannot be materially lowered without crippling the industry. . : Mr. Schwab is president of the Bethlehem Steel corporation and chairman of the board. His company has Issued $15,000,000 in common stock and a like amount of preferred stock. the common stock has never paid a dividend and is selling at about 38. The preferred is a seven per cent, stock which never paid seven per cent, and has not anything since 1908. It sells around 72. Mr. Schwab’s company is one of the many which “capitalized the economies of consolidation;’’ that is to say issued watered stock during the era of trust promotion. The $15,000,000 of common stock is mostly representative of that kind of capitalizationand if he means that tariff revision will cripple the iron industry by discouraging that kind of financing he is perfectly right. The American people are not going to revise the tariff with a view of furthering the scheme of high finance or to help anyone pay dividends on water. But there is a further fact in Mr. Schwab’s interview that is highly Illuminating. He said he had Just returned from Italy, where his company has closed a contract to supply armor plate for the Italian navy. Mr. Schwab’s company has no tariff protection in Italy against such great steel-producing countries as England, France, Germany and Belgium, but he can sell steel against them in that country because he offers the Italians good steel at fair prices. If he can sell steel without tariff protection in Italy he can do it at home.