Southern standard. [volume] (Columbus, Miss.) 1851-1856, 1851-05-31


Plain common sense and figures are a mighty
stumbling block to your fine takers about liberty
and human rights, and our Northern allies viii
feel the peculiar fitness of such test as dollars
and cents. We confess, beforehand, that the esti,
mate we shall present is much too low, for it is
4 impossible to take into account all the ramifed
pecuniary advantages of the Union to the North,
and we have Intentionally put everything at the
loWea mark, SO as to reach results which we con-
hdently believe to be certain.
Everybody knows that all the exports of rice
and of manufactured tobacco and cotton are the
produce of Southern labor. AS to the balance oil
the exports of domestic produce, we shall assume
that the South contributes share in proportion to
her population. 1t is impossible to give the
grounds of this assumption within our narrow
limits, but careful examination of the official
statements from the earliest times, has convinced
US that it does not do the South full Justice Her
naval stores her breadstus, the material she fur
nishes for the exported manufactures, &C., amount
to more than the share we have assigned her of
the other domestic exports, besides rice, cot
ton and leaf tobacco We shall see, In the sequel,
additional confirmation of this belief. But we ad-
here to our rule of using the loa0est figures
In the eleven years from 1870 to 1900 inclu-
sIve, the exports of cotton, rice, and leaf
tobacco, amounted to ninety six millions, Eve use
round numbers, out of three hundred and eleven
produced one hundred and four Millions the North
one hundred. -.and one. Therefore the exports of
Southern produce were in all two hundred Millions
and of Northern one hundred and one Millions
The imports were bought with these exports-were
in fact, their price, and, as such belonged to, and
ought to be divided amongst the producers of the
exports in the ratio of their expectation. This
gives 397 millions of dollars as the returns for
Southern produce, and 2l8 for Northern. The
-bolo LII. A.
trade, both the exports and imports paid in
change, amounted to 597 millions, whilst North
ern labor yielded 329. But during the same peri
cd the actual exports of domestic produce, and
imports in return, from Southern ports, were only
Al millions of dollars in value, and from North
ern ports they reached Sig millions. The North,
therefore, had the and command of 80 and
half millions of the productions of Southern labor
during this period, and the South lost the use of
an equal amount in other words the North
gained the use, and the South lost the use, of
little more, an average, than 164 millions of
Southern capital every year from 1890 to 1900
Instead of remaining in the hands of the Southern
planters merchants, ship owners, agents, i'm
porters, wholesale dealers and retail dealers, build
ing up Southern cities, and giving life and employ
ment to hundreds of Southern people, this 164
millions of dollars worth of the produce of their
labor was transferred by the action of Govern
charge equivalent, given bounty to
Northern labor to build up Northern wealth.
But this was not all, for we have taken no
account of the exports of foreign produce Yet
the foreign goods thus exported were first bought
either with domestic produce, or the credit found
ed on domestic produce. They were the legiti-
mate appendage of the trade in domestic produce,
and may be taken, in part, as an index of what
the credit and command of that trade worth
val WI Of
the European wars, than it has been since in time
of peace. These exports ought, therefore, to be
divided like the imports, amongst the producers OF
domestic exports in the ratio of their production
The whole legitimate Southern trade would thus
be swelled TO 713 millions of dollars, and the
Northern to 4O4; while the actual foreign trade
was 466 and 651 millions respectively, making
the gain to the North and the corresponding loss
to the South of the use of Southern capital aV
eraging over 22 millions of dollars year.
If we apply the same principles of calculation
to the next ten years. from 8O1 to $40 inclusive,
we find that the North had the use of 43 millions,
or counting the exports of foreign produce, of 50
millions year of Southern capital while the South
of course, lost the use of that amount of the pro-
duce of her yearly labor.
From 1911 to 1890, the war with England di
minished the whole commerce of the country, es
pecially the exports of foreign merchandise. Du-
ring this period, the North had the use OF 81 MIL
lions year of the produce of Southern labor, or
deducting the foreign goods exported, of As mil
lions. The South lost the of the same a.
mount.
In the decennial period, 1821-'3O, this gain to
the North, and loss to the South, amounted to 50
millions of dollars annually, or, if we add the ex-
ports of foreign produce, to seventy mine millions
of dolls. annually. In the next period, 1831-'40,
the profit and loss amounts to the enormous sum
of 93 millions per the exports of do
mestc products and return imports, and 1O6 mil
lions the whole foreign commerce. Thus the
South lost the use of the fourth part of the whole
annual products of her industry, estimated by
Prof. Tucker, from the census of $40 and the
North had all that could be made by trading on
this enormous share of the fruits of Southern slave
labor The value to the North of this trade,
which properly belongs to the South, is still in
creasng, for in 1848 we find that the free States
had the use of 1870 millions of dollars worth of the
produce of Southern labor for foreign commerce,
or of 1873 millions, if we add the exports of for
eign merchandise. The slave States lost the use
of this great capital, and the North gained it with
out paying any sort of equivalent in return
To estimate the value of the Union to the North
in this regard, more palpably and justly, let u'
see what it has been worth to every family of sil
persons, in each decennial period, counting the
population at an average between the census at th'
beginning and that at the end of each period
| We place the results in table:
- /