The Athens post. [volume] (Athens, Tenn.) 1848-1917, 1857-10-09
MOVEMENTS OF WESTERN PRO-
DICE.

MOVEMENTS OF WESTERN PRO-
DUCE.
1t is obvious (says the Baltimore Amer.
can) that real and permanent relief from the
monetary pressure, now felt generally and
with more or less severity in all our CONNER
cial centres, can only be expected through
the prompt and general movement OF west
ern produce to the sea-board. The wheat OF
the West, now ready or nearly ready for
market, is the substantial means of iqulda
ton to which the country must look for the
payment Of its debts, the re-establishment of
confidence, and the restoration of the equi-
brium of trade now so sadly, and also unne-
cessarily, disturbed. After the wheat will
come the corn, then the cotton and the pro-
vision crops of the country 20 keep up the
activity of a system of business exchanges
necessary to the vitality OF trade. Wheat,
however, is now the resource at hand and the
disposition and means to make 1t available
should be looked for. Place it in the mar
kets of the Atlantic seaboard aud the pro.
cess Of general liquidation will be immedi.
ately commenced, and be kept up by the gra-
dual coming forward of the other products
of the country, the substantial wealth which
it is admitted abundant crops have placed in
its possession. The producer will then be
able to discharge his indebtedness to his To-
cal creditor, the latter will pay up to the At
lantic cities, and we, sending that produce on
to Europe, will re-establish the current of
trade, give activity to our mercantile transac-
tons, employment to our ships, and in the
act of demonstrating an ability to do some
thing, accomplish all that is needed.
Unhappily the distrust existing has had
the effect to keep back the produce Of the
interior, whilst there is also tendency on
the part of farmers to hold of in the hope
of better prices at a later season. We think
that this effect is calculated to exnggerate the
evil it fears, whilst the tendency to hold back
will in the end defeat itself. If our Western
shippers, in distrustful mood, hold back to
see first "who is going to break" they may
find that in Withholding from the East the
means of substantial liquidation, disaster will
become general, and prices under the iniu-
ence of panic 90 below what is desirable eli
ther for them or others. a like effect must
result from keeping their products away from
market. The crops i: is admitted, are quite
equal to the wants of the country and the
demand likely to come from abroad. If the
mass of the grain crop is held back the re-
suit must be beneficial only to the few who
have the sagacity to come forward and se-
cure the best prices now, whilst tho greater
number, catching the infection that will arise
and joining in the rush that must ensne, will
be thrown upon falling and overstocked
market. The truth is that the system of
holding back, of forcing the prices by simi-
lated scarcity, partakes of the nature OF spe-
cuation. and cannot be free from its dangers.
The few, more astute or more fortunate,
make, the greater number lose.
The relief which the country now wants,
we repeat, is an early availability of its pro-
ductive resources, and to effect this object
should be the business Of the press in acting
upon public sentiment, and of our merchants
and banks in affording the necessary facilities.
Let the necessary and proper inducements be
nsad In hrinU the whpat crOD prOmDtlV to
market, and we will begin Immediately to feel
its recuperating effect and to see the way out
of our difficulties. The freight returns of
our railroads are, at present, the true ther-
mometers of our condition, and we must look
to them to learn where we are and what are
our prospects.