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Show KILLING INDUSTRIES. Amhassador Gerard ttl lu ua that the Herman government must continue to diri.t industry na much aft.fr the war as now ivhon tho energies of the nation na-tion are centered in the production of war materials. Mr. Gerard has found Home things to adihire in the trust methods of the Germans aud he recommends rec-ommends them as desirable ' in our own country. For' example, he indorses in-dorses the Webb bill, now before eon-, grew, which would permit , our industries indus-tries to enter into 'combines fox the selling of their goads abroad. In Germany Ger-many the business houses combine for the nelling of goods at homo as well ns in foreign countries and Mr. Gerard seems to regret that our trust laws 4 lftv. prevented bimilar combinations in the I'uitod States. The American people must keep an open mind about industrial and business changes after the war. For many years our political battles raged arouud the theories of tariff and free trade. We were so intent upon the political controversies con-troversies that it did not occur to us for a long timo to tako the tariff out of politics and make it a matter for scientific, investigation' and impartial adjustment according to changing conditions con-ditions and not according to fixed and also somewhat mixed theories. Ou the other hand it is easy to gx wrong in comparing conditions in Germany Ger-many with conditions in the United States. And after the war the contrast between American and German conditions condi-tions is apt to be more striking than ever. The war will not. affect us in the same way or in tha same degree as it is affecting Germany. There- will not be such a shifting of industry to' war purposes in this country as there has been in Germany and when readjustment read-justment comes our tusk will not be comparable to the German task. Already dozens and scores of German Ger-man industries have .been practically annihilated by the war. "We have heard from time to time that the Germans have been manufacturing and storing up goods which were to be sold at cut-rate cut-rate prices after the war all over the world. B.v" tKis means, so the legend ran, Germany 'was to regain at one bound its place in the world's commerce. com-merce. What has happened to industrial Germany has been concealed from the outside world, hut A. Curtis Roth, writing writ-ing in the Saturday Evening Post, gives us a glimpse of the real conditions. Mr. Roth was American vice consul at Plaueo, Saxony, for a number of years and remained at his post until tf fcie country went to war with Germany. Saxony, before the war, was a manufacturing manu-facturing center of goods which, for the most part, were sold abroad. The outbreak out-break of the war and the establish-ment establish-ment of the British blockade was a terrific ter-rific blow to Saxony as it was, indeed, to the industries in all parts of the German empire. Mr. Roth describes somo of the effects upon German industry in-dustry as follows: The blockade en" imports down to dangerous minimums. The iron mines of the north lands and of France assured a sufficient supply of this material. Hewever, dangerous dan-gerous shortages of cotton, leather, wool, rubber, gutta percha, nickel and copper developed. It was recognized rec-ognized that Germany must keep house most economically with such stores as she had on hand or face disaster. The necessities brought about by tho cutting oft of normal imports reacted powerfully upon industry. in-dustry. As these shortages have i become more and more serious other industries have gone to the wall, with re?i:tth)L,r fresh losses of capital, of skill and of organization. organiza-tion. Thys. the flourishing artificial silk industrv has been totally de-M de-M roved. Tlie rich carpet-aud-rug industry has fallen into decay, from which it will take years of painstaking pains-taking effort, to rrvivo it. The production of artistic porcelains, rich in coloring and design and as fragile in text nre as ro?e petals, 1ms been sivu ovrr. Th lamed Meissen shops now devote themselves them-selves to the j iron net ion of the heavy cheap war porcelains and the splendid art of 1" fore the war is being forgotten through disuse. The skilled a i fists a-e tailing victims vic-tims on the battle fronts. The manufacture of leather ylnverf and o t li e r leather good not for a r m y ii '-o has stopped. The manufacture of broi:zewa re has been out-lavv'd. out-lavv'd. So ;;i.-o ha? rb- manufacture fii bonbons. The (iernians consume a gruat part of th-"ir suar production produc-tion in the man;i ? act lire of glycerin, glycer-in, (id t h -i e i ernai ns not enough " ; i y a r for tnMe i.-. even with the ma mi fact ii re of cj ndy don led and that of rake .scverciv restricted. With all Ic.iilding'at a .standstill and with the people pract ici ng a i S pa rta n retrench men t in every pns-fiblc pns-fiblc direction, the largest German furniture factories are running but a fraction of normal time, while the small factories have long pince failed. Hundreds ef lace and pm-broidery pm-broidery firms have failed, and nearly all of them have closed Iheir doors until the dawn of' peace. There is not sn !'f icienfc t extile material ma-terial to waste in fripperies; and so th Is indust ry is being lost . The manufacture of Geuran torchon laces has almost given up, and the women in the forest vil-Inges, vil-Inges, who founerly turned out exquisite ex-quisite lace patterns, are now doing do-ing sweaty hdtor in munition factories. fac-tories. Tho ma nu fa- hi re of fancy dress goods before the var the Germans led the world in the creation of novelty pat t-'".' ns every season has ceased. The men wear mostly field-Cray field-Cray now and the people back home have become i ndi f ferent in matters of stylo and dress. M oro-over, oro-over, it is now three vears since the foreign buyer brought a stream of foreign wealth into the life of the mills. Textile and steI are the backbone back-bone of modern economic life. Germany's Ger-many's textile industry "nas probably prob-ably the most highly developed, in the w'orid. ft proved its efficiency during those years when it successfully success-fully competed, jn the American market over our "prohibitive textile tariff. Germany's dress goods, woolens, cotton stuffs, embroideries, embroider-ies, laces and mixed goods were carried in her argosies nil over the world, bringing iu rich anual returns to the Yatcrlaod. They made the Keenest kind of keen competition for the mills of Great Britain and of - this country. Today, however, the artificial silk industry' is dead; the dress-goods dress-goods mills are stagnant, with plainest patterns; the woolen manufacture manu-facture is dying; the machine lace and embroidery factories have lost their grip and inspiration; and the important sister industry of dyeing and finishing is losing its cunning through disuse. The sorry condition of the textile industry is one of the things that is giving the German warriors pause. Reading Mr. Roth s article we begin to understand what the militarists have done, to Germany. A few years more of peace would havo given Germany au unassailable commercial position. A few years of war have well nigh destroyed de-stroyed an . industrial organization which was one of the marvels of history his-tory and which might have been a continuous con-tinuous blessing to mankind had it not been inseparably linked with militarism. militar-ism. . When the German merchants saw that Germany's trade was irreparably impaired by the var and might not be able to recover for years after peace had beeu declared they became zealous zeal-ous advocates of unrestricted submarine ; warfare They argued that it was necessary to sink the world's ships in order to prevent rival nations from having trade facilities superior to those of Germany after the war. They wanted to start even with tho merchants mer-chants of tho other nations and they maintained that the' best way to even up conditions was to destroy the ocean-carryiug trade of their adversaries. adver-saries. The submarine warfare has stimulated the ship-building industry to such a degree that Germany is apt to be more seriously handicapped as a result re-sult of U-boat war thau if no such war- j fare had been inaugurated. What industrial changes will be necessary nec-essary for us after the conflict we can foresee but dimiy. It is certain that Germany must continue to regulate all of its industries and must even go so far as to direct how every man within the empire shall invest or spend his money. But that does not signify that the United States must do the same. Our situation will be vastly different. No doubt, some of tho methods which we adopt during the course of the war will be maintained, for even though our rivals bo crippled that very fact will make it necessary for them to establish es-tablish an intensity of competition unheard un-heard of before. |