102 ARCHER BROWN 



tools, and sundry highly finished specialties in which Ameri- 

 can skill finds particular expression. English and German 

 makers have no sooner pulled themselves together and re- 

 duced costs to meet the dreaded American competition, than 

 America has withdrawn from the field. Not only that, but 

 she has astonished them by becoming their largest and best 

 customer, permitting them to ride over the tariff wall with 

 three to five shiploads a day of pig iron, billets, structural 

 shapes, plates, etc. What has made this great change? The 

 revival of trade and industry at home. At the height of 

 phenomental exports, home consumption was still 95 per 

 cent of the American make. Now it is 105 per cent. The 

 home market is, after all, the overshadowing issue. The 

 United States will deal again with the trade of the world 

 when production once more exceeds consumption. 



It is too early yet to measure with any degree of accuracy 

 the influence of the great consolidations upon the future of 

 the American iron and steel industry. Two or three things, 

 however, seem pretty clearly established — and these are 

 contrary to popular notion. The first is that, in the larger 

 lines, there is not, and can not be, any monopoly. Competi- 

 tion will be comparatively free. The smaller manufac- 

 turers will multiply. If the big consolidations flourish, they 

 will fatten. Their supplies can not be shut off. They can 

 use the same materials and processes as their great rivals. 

 Their management will be often of the same high order, for 

 it will come from the men who have created and own their 

 own business. The small independent manufacturer is sel- 

 dom over capitalized, seldom mortgaged, and with light fixed 

 charges, he will have a flexibility in the day of trial which 

 will in a large degree offset the powerful advantages possessed 

 by his huge rival in the ownership of raw materials, carrying 

 facilities, the greatest plants, and unlimited working capital. 

 Consolidations will never eliminate competition in the United 

 States. 



Another result of the great consolidations, already suffi- 

 ciently apparent, is the steadying effect upon values. The 

 violent fluctuations of the past, with their disastrous conse- 

 quences upon all forms of industr}^, are not likel}^ to recur. 



