tariff on iron; but, while recognizing the desirability of stimulating so important an industry, even at considerable cost, it seems clear that the development of transportation facilities was equally or surpassingly important. And, furthermore, a close connection between the tariff and the growth of the iron industry was not apparent. In 1856 the iron producers had had thirteen years of protection, yet they were probably less able to supply the demands of the nation for railway iron than they were in 1846. However that may be, the iron producing interests were clearly ascendant and no concessions were made. Naturally iron interests made least objection to a mere extension of credit, and, as no diminution of duties was involved, protectionists could consistently support such a measure. Accordingly the bill which passed the Senate simply extended three years' credit. Assuming its efficient and rigid administration, such a law would have been fairly well adapted to meet the needs of the time. By its operation railway companies might have gotten under way before being called upon to pay duties, and have profited by the lower price of imported rails. But history shows that the government is not fortunate in the role of creditor, and such an act would probably have involved agitation, litigation, and loss. It is certain that had importation of railway iron and railway construction been encouraged in this way the crisis of 1857 would have been even more severe, and the bad debts of the government numerous. In the debates of the period one of the most noticeable features is the clash of interests between the new and the old states. The older states were fairly well supplied with transportation facilities and were at most relatively indifferent. Within their bounds lay the only important iron manufactures. On the other hand, in the West and South the demand for railways was. strong and these economically new states stood solidly for some concession in duties on railway iron. The rapid expansion of the United States has led to the continuous existence of a sectionalism based upon the difference between the interests of an old, developed community and those of a young and undeveloped one. This sectionalism, a thing entirely apart from that due to different natural environments within a nation of uniform economic development, lies back of many of our problems. The situation is well put in a memorial from a convention held at Richmond, Va., in December, 1854: "The policy of admitting railroad iron free of duty, in the infancy of such enterprises, will not be disputed. It is only contended by your memorialists that the policy was abandoned before the reasons which suggested it ceased to exist; that the railroad system has not yet been sufficiently extended to secure the great objects which entitled it to your most favorable consideration."'"14 Of a like tenor were petitions from Iowa,15 Alabama, and Tennessee.16 "In common with many of the southern and western states, we are extensively engaged in constructing railroads" and why may we not have advantage of free railway iron as did the older states in building their railways! The old states, especially the iron producing ones, were able not only to prevent such advantages, but also to secure provisions in the charter of railways incorporated by Congress that only American rails should be used. The various Pacific railway acts passed during the sixties did so.17 A distinct feature of the preceding agitation concerning imports of railway iron is the existence of several proposals to connect free railway iron with free mail service.18 In 1857 came the crisis of that date and shortly thereafter the Civil War. During this period railroad building was checked and the surplus in the treasury ceased to exist, so that two factors making for free railway iron were withdrawn. In fact, duties were raised on that article as in the case of ail others. The Morrill Act of 1861 laid a specific duty of $12 per ton on iron rails, and a 30 per cent. ad valorem duty on rails of steel. Three years later these rates were raised, imports of iron rails being charged $14 a ton, and steel rails 45 per cent. ad valorem. 14 Sen. Misc., 1854-55, no. 9. 15 Ibid., 1856-57, no. 33. 16 Ibid., 1855-56, no. 21. 17 The provision found in the Texas Pacific charter is typical: "That said road shall be constructed of iron or steel rails manufactured from American ore, except such as may have heretofore been contracted for by any railroad company which may be purchased or consolidated with by the company hereby incorporated." (S. 16.) 18 See above, p. 204. The $14 duty on iron rails remained in force until 1883; but, beginning in 1870, there were several fluctuations in the duty placed upon steel rails. From 1870 on comes a second period of agitation for modification of duties on "railway iron," the steel rail occupying the center of the stage. By 1870 the Bessemer process for converting iron into steelintroduced in this country about 1867-had begun to figure in the supply of rails. In that same year a tax bill passed Congress in which was a clause fixing the duty on steel rails at 11⁄4 cents a pound or about $28 a ton. No opportunity was given for a separate vote upon this clause. At the next session the following resolution was offered:19 "Whereas the improvement in the manufacture of railway iron by the Bessemer or pneumatic process has been such that steel railway bars can now be purchased in this country at an increase of cost of about 20 per cent. over the cost of iron rails; and whereas the proportionate duty on steel rails. ought not now to exceed $20 per ton; and whereas this House passed a tax bill . . . fixing the tariff on steel rails at $27.88 per ton; and whereas a tariff so disproportionate to the cost of the article is calculated to prevent the introduction of better rails, to limit the extension of railways . . . and to diminish the revenue to be derived from this source "therefore, resolved that a bill be brought in fixing the tariff at not over $20 per ton. . . Some concession was made to this movement in 1872 when the duty on steel rails was reduced to $25.20 a ton. Three years later, however, record is found of numerous petitions from manufacturers and workers in steel for a specific duty of one cent per pound and in 1875, the rate was again put at $28. Here it stayed until 1883, when it dropped to $17 and remained there during the rest of our period. One interesting and prominent feature of the discussions on this general subject is the attention paid to labor. For example, Mr. Killinger (Pa.) made a memorial of Pennsylvania ironworkers the occasion for a plea for protection: after eloquently championing them as men whose hands were brown with honest 19 Cong. Globe, 1870-71, p. 175. Not adopted. toil and whose brows were moist with the sweat of honest labor he maintained that their interests were as important as the "hired emissaries of British free trade and the paid agents of importers and monopolists. ''20 References to the interests of labor begin much earlier. In 1854 one argument advanced in favor of extending credit to railways was that it is the duty of government not to throw obstacles in the way of labor, but, by all fair means, to offer facilities for the working man. And not a few similar cases might be cited. These earlier references, however, do not give evidence of an organized labor propagandum, and of demagogic appeals to it, as in the case in the Seventies. With this chapter on import duties and railway iron, the subject of pure congressional aid to railways may be dismissed, although other aid aspects are interwoven throughout the following chapters on Pacific railways. The relatively small proportion of space devoted to the preceding topics makes a sharp contrast between this volume and the one devoted to the period before 1850. 20 Ibid., 1871-72, p. 802. |