Sugar Trust

“ CHICAGO, July, 31.—From nothing to $500,000 is the advance the Sugar Trust has secured on the books of the Board of Review. The American Sugar Refining Company, which is the official name of the trust, escaped taxation altogether last year. W. A. Havemeyer and his attorney, F. F. Reed, appeared before the reviewers. Mr. Havemeyer began by saying the Sugar Trust did not have any stock here on April 1. It had all been sold before that time.
"You must have the money for the sugar you sold, then," insisted Reviewer Upham, suggestively. ”

“ Certain Trusts have certainly been compelled to struggle for the retention of their monopoly power over the market. A notorious example is that of the Sugar Trust, which, after a most successful start in 1888, found itself in 1890 face to face with a new and formidable competitor in the shape of the Claus Spreckles refineries of Philadelphia and San Francisco, and was compelled to forego the high profits it had been making and fight for its existence under terms of keenest competition. ”

“ There has been much complaint of the influence wielded in our Government by rich and powerful corporations such as the Sugar Trust. The more or less arbitrary control exercised by our Government over distant countries with great resources will inevitably stimulate the multiplication of speculative enterprises with much money behind them, subjecting the Government in all its branches to constant pressure and manipulation which cannot fail to produce a most baneful effect upon our politics. ”

“ Federal judges find the sugar trust not subject to the anti-trust law. [584] The Attorney-General has not got decisions in the suits against it for refusal to answer Census questions. Congress forces the people to buy sugar of it only, and at its price. The Secretary of the Treasury drafts for a committee of Congress a tariff like that the trust needs. Our President is the head of the "dominant party that gets the contribution," and he joins the sugar lobby by recommending, unofficially, legislation in its favor. ”

“ A man who wishes to succeed to-day dare not try to compete with the Trust; he must join it or be boycotted by it; that is to say, if he attempts to undersell the Trust, all retail dealers will be forbidden to buy from him, and he will have no market for his goods.
There has been a great outcry against this investigation, and the Trusts are very indignant. They declare that such investigations ruin trade, and make prices higher. To prove this argument, the Sugar Trust has put the price of sugar up an eighth of a cent a pound, or about forty cents a barrel. ”

“ There is a Sugar Trust, which dictates the exact number of cents a pound you must pay for your sugar. A Coffee Trust, which fixes the price of coffee. It is the Coal Trust which keeps the price of coal so high in winter. There is a Gas Trust, a Salt Trust, a Wall-Paper Trust, and indeed a Trust for almost every necessary and useful article. ”

“ The organization, then, is a combination to limit competition, to suppress it, in fact, and the difference between its purpose and work and that of the Sugar Trust is a difference of degree and not of kind. The reason for its moderate demands may be because grocers are more liberal-hearted than refiners, or because they understand that their power over the trade is more limited than those who control the original product, so that an attempt to exact too large profits would offer a tempting premium to competitors of the Association. ”

“ This sacrifice of the means of reciprocity with sugar countries for the advantage of the beet sugar raisers of the West was quickly followed by the acquisition of preponderant interest in the beet sugar refineries by the Sugar Trust, which was thus able to control the domestic market; but for the time being it was evident that the forces friendly to the protective tariff had increased their following in important agricultural regions. ”

“ The principle is general and applies equally well to other trusts, as for instance to the loss of employment by thousands of men working in refineries controlled by the sugar trust, in the fall of 1888. Still another effect of this trust's action is to be especially noted: the fact that the diminished production of oil lessens the demand for seed; and also that in the purchase of seed, as well as in the sale of oil, the trust has killed competition. The trust may, if it chooses, fix uniform prices for the seed which it purchases; and the farmer can take the prices they offer or keep his seed. ”

“ “If I were to name the one crying evil of American life, Mr. Derrick,” he continued, “it would be the indifference of the better people to public affairs. It is so in all our great centres. There are other great trusts, God knows, in the United States besides our own dear P. and S. W. Railroad. Every State has its own grievance. If it is not a railroad trust, it is a sugar trust, or an oil trust, or an industrial trust, that exploits the People, BECAUSE THE PEOPLE ALLOW IT. The indifference of the People is the opportunity of the despot. ”

“ In January, 1891, President Woodruff in his journal wrote: "The President and Twelve met and were in harmony in their conversation upon the manufacture of sugar. The President and Twelve, as the leaders of the people, have to shoulder the responsibility of this question." Men of wealth in the community were afraid of such an enterprise and were especially fearful should it be started it would be crushed at the outset by the great sugar trust. ”

“ Whitman buys his wool according to its value. He does not insist upon paying a fixed price through fear of misrepresentation. Wool is a standard like wheat and corn. Centuries of experience have made men expert in judging its value. Undoubtedly there would be efforts at undervaluation if the duty were according to value. But a specific duty does not prevent fraud—witness the Sugar Trust. Everybody knows that such cheating is dangerous work. Even the Sugar Trust, with all its cunning, has not escaped entirely. ”

“ There is no voice of God to command a distribution of their profits. And they are no longer conducted for the benefit of the community but to exploit it.
The good Mormon must purchase his sugar from "the Church's" sugar company (Joseph F. Smith, president) , which is controlled by the national sugar trust and charges trust prices. He must buy salt from "the Church's" salt monopoly (Joseph F. Smith, president) , which is a part of, and pays dividends to, the national salt trust. ”

“ Advocates of reciprocity urged considerations of honor and fair dealing with Cuba, where, it was said, ruin stared planters in the face. The Administration and a majority of the Republicans favored the cause. Not so senators and representatives from beet-sugar sections. The “insurgents,” as the opponents of reciprocity were called, urged that raising sugar beets was a distinctively American industry, and that to sacrifice it was to relinquish the principle of protection altogether. The so-called “Sugar Trust” favored reciprocity, being accused of expending large sums in that interest. ”

“ Would he not at once go to his attorney and exclaim emphatically that he would spend thousands rather than let the scoundrel who had tricked him get away with his swag?
Suppose our grocer waxing rich invests his funds in the Sugar trust. He thinks he knows all there is to be known about sugar. The business of the trust is to make the sweet commodity and sell it to the people. ”

“ While corporations have no legal power to consolidate, the "trust" was practically a consolidation, which legally had no existence nor responsibility. He declared, further, that resting upon the inherent right of sovereignty, franchises are granted by the State on condition that corporate privileges shall not be abused, shall not antagonize the safety and welfare of the community. It was held proved that the Sugar Trust had not been formed for protection against ruinous competition, but for the illegal purpose of artificially enhancing the cost of a necessary article of commerce ”

“ The employees are not engaged in or about commerce, but exclusively in producing a commodity. And the controversies and evils, which it is the object of the act to regulate and minimize, are local controversies and evils affecting local work undertaken to accomplish that local result. Such effect as they may have upon commerce, however extensive it may be, is secondary and indirect. An increase in the greatness of the effect adds to its importance. It does not alter its character." [452] We again see the influence of the ideology of the Sugar Trust Case. ”

“ Bannigan, with the guarantee of the trustee of the Church, the Presidency and myself. Both the power plant and the sugar factory were financially successful. They performed a large public service beneficently. The fact that Mr. Bannigan held their bonds was no detriment to their work and wrought no injury to the people.
I single out these two enterprises because Joseph F. Smith has since sold the power plant to the "Harriman interests," and the control of the sugar factory to the sugar trust ”

“ Yet when our grocer invests his savings, the sugar stock is many dollars more valuable than when, scared into selling by fluctuations which he cannot see any reason for, he tries to get back his investment. So many times have investors been milked of their savings by this one trust during the past twenty years that in the coffers of its creators and jugglers are hundreds of millions of money that once belonged to the people for which they have received absolutely nothing in return. ”

“ The Senate of the United States cannot be dictated to, in a matter of such importance, by the trust. I will not vote for the differential. I will continue to oppose it to the end. If you're right—if the trust has such power—better that our struggling sugar industry should perish, so that we may arouse the people to the iniquitous manipulation that destroyed it. ”

“ The duty levied on imports by the United States cut their margins down to nothing, labor was scarce and the cost of obtaining it great, the rate of interest was from ten to twelve per cent, agents’ commissions for buying and selling ran from five to ten per cent; in short, many plantations were threatened with utter ruin, and so seriously discouraged did the business men become that the only gleam of hope for the salvation of the sugar industry seemed to be annexation. ”

“ He had taken 20,000 shares all told before the advance had fairly gotten under way at from 143-1/2 to 144. At 170 he gave an order to sell 20,000 shares at a limit of 155, and obtained an average of over 160, thereby netting an estimated snug profit of $250,000 or more within two hours. Asked as to whether the strength in Sugar meant a settlement of the Sugar war, Mr. Lawson smiled and said: "There has never been any Sugar war."
The conservative people on the Street are disposed to regard the whole movement as a piece of clever manipulation. ”

“ To say that it is an 'unwilled asset' is practically to hold that it is a gift from the government, 'without anything in the nature of a consideration,' and that the amount of sugar produced is only to be considered as the measure of the bounty. ”

“ I find that defendants' dominant purposes in organizing the Institute were: to create and maintain a uniform price structure, thereby eliminating and suppressing price competition among themselves and other competitors; to maintain relatively high prices for refined, as compared with contemporary prices of raw sugar; to improve their own financial position by limiting and suppressing numerous contract terms and conditions; and to make as certain as possible that no secret concessions should be granted. ”

“ Thirdly, that the State may use its credit, after strict investigation of the circumstances and upon conviction of the validity of the security, to enable prospective producers to borrow money at a low rate of interest. The Sugar Works Guarantee Act, of which I have quoted the provisions, has led other producers to ask for similar concessions. The {81} farmers want flour mills and cheap money; the pastoralists and graziers complain of the tax levied upon them under the Meat and Dairy Produce Encouragement Acts. Why, they ask, should the sugar industry be exceptionally favoured? ”

“ It was a new extension of the plan of taxing some of us for the benefit of others of us. Let it be noticed, too, that when it suited their purpose, the protectionists were ready to sacrifice the sugar industry of Louisiana without the least concern. We have been trying for twenty-five years to secure the home market and keep65 everybody else out of it. As soon as we get it firmly shut, so that nobody else can get in, we find that it is a question of life and death with us to get out ourselves. ”

“ We condemn the present administration for not keeping faith with the sugar producers of this country. The Republican party favors such protection as will lead to the production on American soil of all the sugar which the American people use, and for which they pay other countries more than $100,000,000 annually. To all our products—to those of the mine and the fields as well as to those of the shop and the factory—to hemp, to wool, the product of the great industry of sheep husbandry, as well as to the finished woollens of the mill—we promise the most ample protection. ”

“ There are not many legitimate enterprises in the world which would bear such charges and leave a profit to the manager. But it is on this system that the planting of sugar has been, to a large extent, carried on for years in the Islands. Under it a good deal of money has been made, but not by the planters. ”

“ Now, if the drawback is not reduced in proportion to the reduction of the duty on the raw sugar, two very injurious consequences will result to the public: first, that a large sum of money will be annually taken out of the treasury in gratuitous bounties to sugar refiners; and next, that the consumers of refined sugar will have to pay more for American refined sugar than foreigners will; for the refiners getting a bounty of five cents a pound on all that is exported, will export all, unless the American consumer will pay the bounty also. ”