684 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. * 



A Delaware jute manufacturer writes : 



For several years i)ast tlie absence of profit has been the chief discouragement. 

 Now, however, with the revival of business, from itsiaving been almosf impossible 

 to get the cost of production, a decided improvement in this respect has taken place. 

 Should this state of things continue, as the quantities of jute goods imported largely 

 exceed those produced at home, we have little doubt that the domestic production 

 will rapidly increase. The machinery used is mostly imported at a duty of from 35 

 to 45 per cent, ad valorem. The raw fiber used is also subject to a tax of $15 per ton 

 (specific; while some of the principal productions, such as burla^is and carpet yarns, 

 are subject to a duty of but 25 per cent, ad valorem. With the immense factories, 

 large capital, and long experience of the British manufacturers, added to their ability 

 to purchase the fiber at $15 per ton less than Americans, and their ability to buy ma- 

 chinery at about 40 per cent, less, including freight, it is almost impossible to compete 

 with them where but a 25 per cent, ad valorem duty is imposed on their productions 

 except when the price is high. Hence, the burlaps used in this country are almost 

 exclusively imported. 



Another manufacturer writes to the same effect, that the chief hin- 

 derance to successful flax and jute manufacture is foreign competition — 

 not quite duty enough on coarse linen goods. If protection is good for 

 the manufacturer, and will enable competition with the foreign markets, 

 ynll not the farmer derive equal beneht from a protection which will en- 

 able him to compete with the foreign producers ? It certainly is a ]ioor 

 rule that does not work well both ways. If the statement of our cor- 

 respondent in Dayton, Ohio, is correct, that there is flax enough grown 

 for the seed alone in the United States to supply all demands and uses 

 for the fiber, and that a little protection against jute and foreign tows 

 would place the flax industry of the Northwest upon its feet again, is it 

 not worth consideration ? The tariif question is a grave one to settle, as 

 there are so many conflicting interests involved. It is a question that 

 cannot be decided hastily in favor of the interest representing the 

 greater amount of capital, or having the greater influence. " Powerful 

 pressure " is a good motive as far as it relates to the running of a steam- 

 engine, or the turning of a turbine water-wheel, and particularly so if 

 the machinery of a large manufacturing establishment is moved in con- 

 sequence ; but it is not an agency to be used in securing wise legisla- 

 tion. There is but one way to grasp the question, and that in its rela- 

 tion to the best interests of the whole country. We cannot legislate 

 for the benefit of the manufacturer alone at the expense of native pro- 

 duction of the raw material ; neither can we protect the farmer at the 

 expense of the final consumer. There is a point, howeter, at which the 

 best interests of all classes will be subserved, and any effort that may 

 be made toward an equitable and just tariff in regard to fibers will lead to 

 the establishment of native industries, which will prove to the country 

 a vast soui'ce of wealth. 



CULTIVATION. 



In this limited report it is not proposed to give a treatise on flax or 

 hemp culture, but to indicate briefly a few of the most essential i)oints 

 in its profitable production. That it is not an exhaustive crop, as 

 urged by many, is abundantly proved by repeated chemical tests in this 

 country and Europe, showuig that flax takes less inorganic matter from 

 the soil, per acre, than wheat, oats, barley, or tobacco. It must, how- 

 ever, prove an exhausting crop, as its cultivation is practiced in many 

 portions of the West, where the seed is sold to the oil mills, the straw 

 burned, and nothing returned to the soil. As the fiber is composed of 

 elements taken almost wholly from the atmosphere, while the mineral 

 elements of the soil are found in the waste material of the plant, the 

 only rational course tc pursue suggests itself. 



If, therefore, only the fiber is sold, the oil extracted from the seed, and the residue 

 mswie into oil-cake and f«d upou th& farm, the plant xetted upon the laud on «rluch it 



