INVESTIGATING THE TRUST PROBLEM 115 



length of time at least the greater corporations have been able 

 to increase the margin of profits. This study ought to be 

 extended now that the way has been pointed out. The report 

 furnishes a certain amount of material upon which a study 

 could be based, and in addition material will be found in the 

 bulletin of the department of labor for July, 1900, in the re- 

 port of the senate committee on prices and wages, and in 

 the bulletin of the department of labor for March, 1902, 

 on the course of wholesale prices from 1890 to 1901. It 

 is possible to determine from a study of the available data 

 certain facts with regard to the control of prices by the con- 

 solidations, that are now mere opinion. The chief defect of 

 the report of the commission is that it often deals with opin- 

 ions when it might have given us facts. Possibly this defect 

 is incident to the method of the investigation, the examina- 

 tion of witnesses from all callings in life ; still it will generally 

 be admitted that the commission might have given the public 

 more of the kind of work that is included in Jenks's study 

 of prices. To illustrate: the report of the commission de- 

 votes a very large space, both in the testimony and in its 

 final report to the relation of the tariff and the trusts. The 

 question of the tariff has been made so much a political one 

 that the investigation is less valuable. It is everywhere 

 evident that party interests are attempting to justify party 

 policy or make political capital out of the interrelation of 

 the trusts to the tariffs. It is stated, for instance, that the 

 tariff "is the mother of trusts," that the tariff is responsible 

 to a large extent for the existence of the trusts in the United 

 States. In answer to this charge attention is called to the 

 fact that trusts exist in England. Therefore, the conclusion 

 is that the tariff is not responsible for the trusts. This is 

 nothing more nor less than an attempt to throw dust into the 

 eyes of the public. The whole question is not, does the exist- 

 ence of the protective tariff favor the formation of trusts, 

 but rather, under the protective regime are the trusts, after 

 their formation, able to increase the margin of profit, to raise 

 the level of prices above the competitive level? This is the 

 question at issue and one which cannot be answered by the 

 expression of opinion, but by a study of facts. How do the 



