Image provided by: University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Lincoln, NE
About The Conservative (Nebraska City, Neb.) 1898-1902 | View Entire Issue (March 29, 1900)
6 The Conservative * the planting , nnd so two hundred trees were planted along the streets. Again they sought the city officials and plead their cause , arguing the finan cial value of trees as seen in the sale of laud bearing shade trees in preference to treeless lots , in the greatly lessened cost of watering bhaded streets , in the attractiveness to summer visitors , and above all to their health giving prop erties. The committee's desire was to encircle the city trees with strong wire netting six feet in height , to prevent gnawing by horses , as they considered the dam age done by horses greater than by ov erhead wires , or underground pipes. Many times during the three years of working and waiting they had cause to remember the psalm that reads , "Hope deferred maketh the heart sick , but when the desirecomethitisasa tree of life"when a letter from the Mayor announced that five thousand dollars had been granted as an initial approp riation to protect the city trees. The work of guarding by wire is be gun , and the club has every reason to expect that every street tree will in time be healed of its wounds , guarded by wire , cleaned , trimmed and restored to health and beauty , and this is a service work the Roxburghe Olub of Boston will have done for its native city. Will not this example encourage clubs to do practical work in tree preserva tion ? Let us club women then inform our selves on forestry , invite lecturers to in struct us in practical AVork ! Work ! cal tree planting , study our local conditions , , induce our street surveyors to spare wayside trees and shrubbery , call attention through the press to the destruction by wires , pipes , insects and horses , ask builders to box trees during building , and if we can plant but one tree , plant it on a hot dusty highway or in a school yard. Let us add a new chapter to Arbor Day history on the lost Saturday of April , and let our title be "PLANT TREES. " Cora O. Jones , in the Club Woman , March , 1900. THE LEAD TRUST. Much has been written and spoken of late about trusts. For the life of me I cannot ECO the difference between what a trust can do and what a firm with a large capital can do. Both may employ a promoter and place worthless shares of stock , bonds or some variety of "securities" on sale , keeping an eye on the guileless all of which is common and , like the confidence game , goes on forever. I cannot , however , share in the abuse of a fair and honest aggregation ol capital and especially of that particular aggregation known as a corporation an absolutely necessary form or organ ization for carrying on business but I Ol will and can agree with the utter con demnation of what some of them do , what they are intended for doing , but what is only made possible for them to do by the government being in partner ship with them and a most powerful partner , too , without a share in the profits , as a government. The government booms the stock , seeps off any competitors , humps things up occasionally for the stockholders by utrodnciug a bill in congress for build ings , ships and what not and lately a coterie has the gall to propose that the government pay for building other ships ; hau its own. Well may farmers say : 'Pay us for raising wheat. " Extortion Duo to Protection. The most of the combines of today , created for the purpose of extortion in price , could not and would not exist , if it was not for the part the United States takes in them. Here is one example , and the same is true of several commodities managed by combines. This quotation is from the New York Commercial , March 6 , 1900 : "Lead. Was steady and unchanged at 4.70c per Ib. spot to March. In St. Louis the market was firm , with scant offerings at 4.57) ( a ) 4.62 , according to brands. Soft Spanish was unchanged at 16 11s 8d in London. Arrivals at bins port were 1,000 tons bullion from Tampico ; exports from this port , 650 tons to Hamburg. Imports of lead dur ing the week ending March 2d were 2,806 tons ; exports for the week 1,794 tons. " Few see these quotations. Very few understand them. The great mass do not know anything about them what ever. Figure out the pounds , shillings and pence the London quotation for a long ton of 2,240 Ibs. , audit makes the price of lead in London $3.60 per 100 Ibs. as against $4.70 in New York $1.10 more in New York than London , or a difference of $22.00 per ton of 2,000 Ibs. Yet , some is exported and must go at the price in London. Please note , some is imported , also ; this is brought here and re-exported without payment of any duty. The kernel of it all is that about twenty men are managing the matter of price of all the lead consumed in the United States and have been doing so for some time with the aid of the government. Not a pound is sold with out the concurrence of these men , and it is held as firmly and nicely as could be. It is managed with consummate skill. Free Trade the Remedy. Most likely many will say , at firsl thought : "It is nothing to me if there is a duty on lead. " Such people do not know how this material enters into the cost of so many things. Thousands oi men arc working with this material , which costs 80 per cent more than il should 80 per cent artificial value. Wo pay this artificial price but the govern ment does not get it. ( It amounts to about $5,000,000 a year extorted from ; ho American people. ) It enters into ; ho cost of every house built and of a ; housaud and one things which people do not know that lead has anything to do with. This lead combine has arisen and is a result of the tariff on lead. It could not exist without this tariff. It is the very perfection of a trust or combine brought into existence by the government's action. The same may bo said of luni- 30r , and of many other articles manu factured by trusts. Truly it may be said the commercial element is predomi nating in affairs of government in an unwonted degree. Evidently there is some reward for the "fat frying" process in the past and a keen eye on ; he future. Under the tariff law one can import .ead , make it into pipe , re-export it , and get the duty remitted. But one who makes it into forms not capable of being identified , although for export , cannot get the duty remitted. Thus one citizen can have , while another cannot have , free trade in the same article. This drawback clause was framed in recog nition of the fact that foreign commerce can only be carried on saccessfully with freedom of trade. If the actual effects of protective tariff legislation were known , it would be swept out of exist ence quickly , and our congress would be confined to its true constitutional functions. Its hands would then bo kept off from all attempts at fixing values of commodities. GEOHGE A. MAOUETH. Pittsburg , Pa. PresidentSchur- SCHURMAN ON PORTO RICO.man > of Cornell University and the president of the former Philippine com mission , wrote the following letter to a friend giving his ideas on the Porto Rican tariff : ITHACA , March 12. DEAR SIR : I agree with you that the United States is under obligation to ex tend its tariff laws to the island of Porto Rico. But I cannot accept your conten tion that this obligation is derived from the Constitution , which , in my judg ment , does not of its own force apply to annexed territories. The obligation is moral , not Constitutional. As the presi- ident said , with equal truth and felicity , it is "our plain duty. " We are bound to this course by solemn promises. The supreme and irresistible reason for remov- Hound l > y ProiiiisoK , . . , , ing all customs barriers between the United States and Porto Rico is the promise made by Gen eral Miles , when first lauding American forces on the island , that the Porto R lo ans should enjoy the same rights , privi- eges , and immunities as the people of the United States. On this understand-
