OCR Text |
Show Dangerous to Sugar Interests. Milwaukee, Wis., March 22, The prospects of the establishment establish-ment of new beet sugar factories in Utah is attracting wide attention, atten-tion, owing to the dnnger of the passage of the democratic bill providing for the removal of the tariff on sugar, but nowhere is the danger appreciated greater than in Wisconsin, for it was at a Milwaukee conference a few days ago that C. G. Hamlin of Colorado Springs, chairman of the executive committee of the United States Beet Sugar Industry, Indus-try, made his declaration that the democratic bill would throttle the beet sugar industry, prevent the building of new factories at a cost of $25,000,000 and the expenditure ex-penditure of $25,000,000 a year in the purchase of beets from farmers. The free sugar plan of the democrats, he said, would give the sugar trust a monopoly of the industry, and he hinted in no mild form that once given a monopoly, and with the beet sugar industry destroyed the lower prices under the tariff would be only temporary. Last year's experience when sugar mounted to 8 and 9 cents a pound in some parts of the country jWhen the beet sugar output for the year was consumed, was I only an instance of what might 1 happen with the sugar trust in control of the industry. Mr. Hanrlin's statement, which was made for the independents of the country, 90 per cent of whom are represented in the association or which he spoke, was as follovs: ' If the tariff is cut the farmers who raise sugar beets will be the most immediate sufferers. The retention of the present duty will mean the investment of millions in new factories. "The people generally are wholly ignorant of the sources of these attacks. The agitation is wholly inspired by the New j York refiners and importers of foreign raw sugar, who see their business menaced by the competition of beet sugar, the interests usually known as the sugar trust. "Every refiner who testified before the Hardwick committee and practically all the refiners on the eastern seaboard did testify, I expressed themselves in favor of free sugar or, at leas, a drastic cut in the present duty; and all testified that their reascn j for desiring the removal or reduction re-duction of duty was" due to the fact that the beet sugar industry was menacing the monopoly which they once enjoyed. "John Arbuckle, the coffee king, is one of the most vocifer- ous advocates of free sugar. The j testimony of Mr. Jamison, one I : of his partners, is significant. In testifying in favor of; free sugar and giving his reasons why he favored the same, he said that it j was on account of the beet pro- j duct. Mr. Jamison further said: j 'If there was no duty I dopot , think the beet would be so pro-1 sperous and wo wotfld probably sell more sugar if it (the duty) I was removed, I mean Ho was 'only one of many who testified along the same lines. "Mr. Arbuckle may be a philanthropist phil-anthropist so far assugar is concerned, con-cerned, but his record with regard re-gard to coffee can. scarcely be looked upon as aguanntee in this direction. Coffee has doubled dou-bled in price in a very short time, and that it has doubled is due to the monopoly enjoyed by a lew men. uestroy tne com- petition which the refiners have 5 to meet on account of the domes- tic beet production and what, guarantee has the consumer that ' i a like monopoly will not be es- tablished in sugar?- "We are now producing about 600,000 tons of beet sugar peri annum. Were the industry per-' mitted to grow-, this amount! would be doubled within a reasonable time andtho consumer would receive the benefit. In addition to this, the incidental advantages to our agriculture! can not be magnified. After a careful study of the industry in ' Iowa, Mr. Wallace, in an article j recently published in Wallace's! Farmer, reached tho deliberate conclusion that 'the culture of sugar beet as it spreads will revolutionize rev-olutionize the ariculturo of the ' northern part of the corn belt' and if it is true of this. section it is true of the wheat belt of ' Minnesota and the Dakota? and ' all thai great agricultural section extending from Pennsyvania westward to the Pacific, which, according to the reports of our department 'of agriculture, is adapted to the production of sugar beets. "If this industry is destroyed it will be because our people are ignorant of its importance as related to our agricultural and industrial development." |