Mr. BOUTELL. Who is the chief representative of that association who acts for all the members?

Mr. JONES. We have a secretary and treasurer.

Mr. BOUTELL. They are the general officers of this association? Mr. JONES. Yes, sir.

Mr. BOUTELL. Do you fix the price at meetings or by correspondence?

Mr. JONES. By conference.

Mr. BOUTELL. That fixing of price, you say, relates only to certain imported wares?

Mr. JONES. It relates to only English ware, and that English ware is of a standard brand and is represented by half a dozen potters only. But in fixing that price I want to impress upon your mind that a member of the association is not bound by that price if he wishes to meet the competition of some one who is not affiliated with the association.

Mr. BOUTELL. Aside from the ones who do not affiliate, is there any rivalry?

Mr. JONES. No, sir.

Mr. BOUTELL. With the exception of the 70, all the others act independently in fixing prices?

Mr. JONES. Yes, sir.

Mr. BOUTELL. Your association only fixes the price on a certain article imported from England?

Mr. JONES. Yes, sir.

Mr. BOUTELL. You deal very largely with hotels, restaurants, and places of that kind?

Mr. JONES. Yes, sir.

Mr. BOUTELL. There is no attempt, then, to fix the price except on this one article?

Mr. JONES. There is no fixing the price at all for a hotel or restaurant in any part of the country.

Mr. BOUTELL. Is there any division of territory in dealing with the

restaurants or hotels?

Mr. JONES. None whatever.

Mr. BOUTELL. So there is absolute competition and rivalry among the jobbers and wholesalers in the hotel and restaurant business? Mr. JONES. Yes, sir; very active competition.

Mr. BOUTELL. As you are both a wholesaler and retailer, you can answer, of course, this question: If we should repeal the duty on all common earthenware, crockery, and china-that is, the undecorated and the unornamented pottery and china-the importers or jobbers could get it at a reduced rate?

Mr. JONES. You mean abroad? The importer must seek his goods abroad.

Mr. BOUTELL. Do you mean to say that the repeal of the 55 per cent duty on plain china would not affect the price here in the local market of the domestic manufacturer?

Mr. JONES. I think it would.

Mr. BOUTELL. If we should repeal the duty on the unornamented grades of earthenware, crockery, and china, would not the wholesalers get the domestic goods cheaper than now?

Mr. JONES. They would.

Mr. BOUTELL. Then would not the wholesalers, with this active. competition which you have spoken of in all these matters, be compelled to furnish these goods at a cheaper rate to the retailer? Mr. JONES. Logically; yes.

Mr. BOUTELL. With the full and free competition which you have spoken of, is it not probable that the entire amount of the duty, if repealed on these common goods, would be passed on by the wholesaler to the retailer so the retailer would get a substantial part of the benefit of the reduction?

Mr. JONES. The retailer and consumer both.

Mr. BOUTELL. We have traced the reduction to the retailer, which I am very glad to hear in this one case.

Mr. JONES. The lower the cost of the goods, the lower the consumer gets them.

Mr. BOUTELL. If that is the case, and the retailer gets these goods at a cheaper price, then the final ultimate consumer, the purchaser and user of the goods, would get them at a cheaper price?

Mr. JONES. Yes, sir.

Mr. BOUTELL. Is it not a fact, in your experience as wholesaler and retailer, that the undecorated earthenware, pottery, and white china is a class of goods that is most largely used by the people of moderate means?

Mr. JONES. I should say the very poorer class.

Mr. BOUTELL. The very poorer class are the ones who are deserving of consideration?

Mr. JONES. But this fact should be borne in mind, the standard of tableware has been elevated year by year because the American housewife has tried to have something better than white ware.

Mr. BOUTELL. I understand that fully, but it seems to me as though the question should really answer itself, that this plain white ware and the other common ware is the ware that goes most largely to the consumer and to the small hotels and restaurants.

Mr. JONES. Yes, sir.

Mr. BOUTELL. Therefore, in seeking to revise these schedules, would it not be possible by a very large reduction or even a repeal of the duties on this common ware and by some increase in the duties on the decorated ware to keep the revenues about the same?

Mr. JONES. I think if you increased the duties about 65 per cent you would reduce the volume of ware that would be consumed and you would reduce the volume of revenue.

Mr. BOUTELL. Yes, sir.

Mr. JONES. And the more you increase the price the less the number of people who can buy it.

Mr. BOUTELL. Then, if we should repeal the duties on the common ware and lower the duties on the higher class of goods, would not that keep the revenues about the same?

Mr. JONES. Yes, sir.

Mr. BOUTELL. So by repealing the duties on this common ware we would greatly benefit the consumer of this common ware, and by a slight reduction in the duty on the high decorated goods we would keep the revenues about the same?

Mr. JONES. Yes, sir.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. You can not draw a distinction in the value of the product by the distinction that is drawn in the tariff bill now between decorated and undecorated ware?

Mr. JONES. No, sir.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. Some undecorated ware is very high-priced pottery?

Mr. JONES. Yes, sir.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. And some cheap pottery is decorated?
Mr. JONES. Yes, sir; that is true.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. If you wanted to draw a distinction between the high-priced imported pottery and the white ware for ordinary family use, how would you technically draw that distinction?

Mr. JONES. Well, that would be a difficult question to answer, because you take the decorated china that now comes from Germany, which will sell, we will say for $10 a dinner set, and the housewife who has some pride, but who lives in a very moderate way, is going to have a decorated dinner set anyway; her pride leads her to that ambition.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. As I understood you a while ago, you said that there was practically no importations of the cheaper ware that was used by the masses of the people of this country?

Mr. JONES. I think more than half of the crockery ware used by the people of this country is made by the American potter, and will be, anyway.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. I know. Did you not state that practically all the cheaper ware was made in the United States?

Mr. JONES. Substantially so; it depends upon how far you want to pay.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. That is just exactly what I am coming to. I want to know where you draw the line substantially-of course I do not mean absolutely accurately-but where you draw the line in saying that the American producer has a monopoly of the market?

Mr. JONES. Well, that should be qualified, because the common ware is more than the common white ware. There is a very poorly decorated ware which the American potter makes. It is the quality of workmanship. The American potter has sought to produce quantity, and when he made the cheap decorated ware he slighted it. The good housewife desires a good dinner set handsomely decorated, and so she can see her fingers through it, and between the American decorated ware, which can be bought for $6, which she can not see through, as against the $10, she is going to take the $10 set.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. The cheaper class of pottery that you can not see through, you think is entirely made in this country?

Mr. JONES. I do not say entirely; largely.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. There is practically no competition on that line of goods imported from abroad?

Mr. JONES. This $10 set competes with the $6 set.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. But there is no competition at the same price.
Mr. JONES. No, sir.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. Is it not a fact that as to the cheaper class of pottery the American producer can compete with the foreign producer?

Mr. JONES. In low grades of ware.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. And on the high grades of ware, the very highest grades of ware, there is practically no competition in this country, because it is not made here?

Mr. JONES. To a very limited extent only.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. So there is a monopoly in the tariff for the low grade for the American producer?

Mr. JONES. That is true.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. And the high-grade European china does not come into competition with any china made in Âmerica?

Mr. JONES. I think it does.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. But the class of people who want to buy a fine table set, the finest tableware, do find that ware in this country at all?

Mr. UNDERWOOD. And they go abroad to get it regardless of what the manufacturer charges for his product?

Mr. JONES. That is a question of comparison. Now, when you say that the consumer who wants a china dinner set must go abroad to get it or not have it, if it is a fine china dinner set, yes; if it is ordinary decorated ware, no; she may find a poor quality of American ware that she will buy here.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. Is any of the American ware machine made, or does machinery enter into a large portion of its manufacture? Mr. JONES. Very largely.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. To what extent does machinery enter into the American-made ware?

Mr. JONES. I think the Americans are up even with the English in machine methods and in modern appliances. I think this laborsaving machinery is prevalent in America, in England, in France, and in Germany.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. Then, the labor-saving machinery enters very largely into the production of crockery ware?

Mr. JONES. It does.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. What percentage is the cost of labor in the cost of production of American tableware?

Mr. JONES. That is a question that I am not able to answer, but a gentleman who will follow me has those statistics.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. The percentage of labor in the production of crockery ware is not great, because it is largely produced by machinery, is it?

Mr. JONES. That is true.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. So far as machinery is concerned, is not the American in advance of the world in labor-saving machinery and the handling of it?

Mr. JONES. In pottery?

Mr. UNDERWOOD. Yes, sir.

Mr. JONES. I think England and America are on a parity. I want to say this: We import from Japan. They have no machinery there. The china that comes from Japan is ornamented china, and my partner, who goes there, says that they have no machinery, and I have learned this fact, that an American or English pottery workman can do the work of three or four Japanese by modern machinery.

The Japanese potter has to be waited upon by three or four more, and the more they employ the better they like it. Japanese labor is not to be compared with American labor. They have several operatives to do what one operative does here. There is another thing that I want to say, because we are talking about dinner sets. There has been talk about Japanese china coming in here, made by very cheap labor, and which might interfere largely with the products of the American potter. My knowledge enables me to say that the Japanese have never progressed far enough to make a sound piece of ware the size of a dinner plate. They have never made a platter. They can not make a plate or a platter that is merchantable, and therefore they can not make a dinner set. No dinner sets come into this country from Japan, and yet sometimes when I talk with the American_potters they say that they have to compete with Japanese labor. They do not send a dinner set; they do not know how to make it. They have not up to this time made one.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. Therefore the competition in china ware from Japan is not a serious competition?

Mr. JONES. It is not, except in small things, little things like vases as big as your fist. To-day Japanese china of that character is a drug on the market; there is more here than can be sold. I do not regard the Japanese trade as amounting to anything as far as we go, and yet we import it all the time in a small way.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. You say that you have to pay the duty on the package. I do not understand exactly what you mean by that.

Mr. JONES. Let me make it clear, if I may. A crate of ware ready to pack requires a crate that costs us 17s. 6d. That is dutiable at the same rate as the contents. If the contents are taxed at 50 per cent or 55 per cent, that 17s. 6d., equal to $4.37, with 60 per cent duty, makes the cost $7. That crate is necessary for the safe transportation of the contents. We have to pay the same rate of duty on that outside package as we pay on the contents. That is a severe tax burden on the contents, and when we open that crate here and sell the contents we can only sell at a fraction of the $7. Therefore, that is a part of this tax burden.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. In other words, you pay 60 per cent or 55 per cent, whatever it may be, on the value of the crate in which the china is shipped?

Mr. JONES. Precisely.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. That makes the rate of duty for the china in excess of 55 per cent or 60 per cent?

Mr. JONES. I could demonstrate that it brings the duty up to 80 per cent or 90 per cent.

Mr. UNDERWOOD. You stated that the cost of importation was increased by breakage. Have you estimated that in a systematic way so you can state to the committee what percentage the breakage amounts to?

Mr. JONES. In a general way, in the many years I have been in business we have figured that the breakage amounts to 23 per cent, on the average. If the ship meets stress of weather and shifts the cargo and those crates come up on the pier evidently smashed inside, what does the law allow us to do? It allows us to abandon those crates and give them to anybody who can cart them off, but we have 61318-TARIFF-No. 13-08-2