The weekly Mississippian. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1859-1864, 1859-08-17
From the Noble Register.
The Slave Trade Question.

: We favor the abrogation of our tederalstat
4 utes and treaties against the African slay
1 trade, not only because they contain an often
siye reflection upon the institutions OF tn
South, but because, in our Judgment, the vi
tai necessities, industrial and POLITICAL of tn
Southern States require that the traffic shoult
: be re-opened. The paramount interest of tn
Southern people is. to preserve to themselve
, the monopoly they now in great measur
possess of the cotton production which sup
Plies the commerce of the world. Upon thi
depends their welfare, we may say, theirsery
existence; and the object can only be secured
by their continuing to prove themselves equa
to the mission Of meeting the wants of COM
merce in this particular. Their production
of the great staple must keep pace with the
s increasing demand for it else, other sources
i Of supply will be sought, and will inevitably
be found. 1t is delusion to conclude that
the partial and lucrative monopoly we have
hitherto enjoyed of the cotton supply is per-
manently secure against competition, because
of the failure of the efforts so far to find sub
stitute for it, and that we are able to defy the
. enterprise, and dictate to the wants of the
world, in whatever limitations may clrcum-
scribe our production, or whatever high prices
| it may reach. 1t is true we have vastly su-
perior advantages over any other portion Of
the earth for the production of cotton, in our
more suitable climate and system of labor ;
and it is these advantages combined with the
essential fact that our production has hitherto
so Appropriated the demand as not to oppress
it with high prices, that have so far rendered
abortive the efforts to compete with US. But
| it is by no means demonstrated that it is not
/ possible under any circumstances for the wants
of commerce in the matter OF our great staple
to be supplied by production in the other
quarters of the globe besides OR Southern
States. The accumulated demand which will
exist when our production shall come to fall
far short Of the needed supply, and when the
price shall in consequence have mounted up
| to an exorbtant elevation, will have given
prodgious stimulus to the efforts that have
been undertaken to create other sources of an
adequate supply And can it be reasonably
doubted that under the impulse of this potent
stimulus to human enterprise and industry, a
cotton production, which will be adequate to
the demands of commerce, will, in process and
at no very distant period of time, be built up
outside of this country? When that shall
have been accomplished, our monopoly of the
cotton production is gone, and the foundations
of our Southern industry our wea tn and pros
perity, our political strength and importance,
and our civilization, will have been fatally
sapped.
If then it is an object of vital interest with
the people of our Southern States to retain
the monopoly of the cotton production which
supplies commerce, and to disarm and keep
down that outside competition which would
be fatal to their industry, it becomes them to
provide with a wise forcaste against every
danger that may threaten to defeat that OBJ
ject. There is danger, and most serious
one, in the fact that our production of cotton
is becoming more and more inadequate to the
demand for it; that it does not keep that pace
with the increasing consumption which is in
40 ssssSsJ laSaLsal5 Paus-
perity. The obvious cause Of this is defici-
ency of slave labor in this country. The in
crease of our cotton production depends upon,
and goes hand in hand with, the increase of
the slave population of the nine cotton-g grow
ing States has usually been at the rate of four
per cent. That increase has been largely due
to the supply of slaves from the surplus in the
border and older slave States. But that sup
ply has, to great extent ceased, so that now
the rate of increase is very considerably di-
minished. The increase of the consumption
of cotton has, for number Of years past been
at the rate of six per cent, and the rate must
continue to grow still greater. Proceeding
from these and other data, it is shown that,i in
1860 the demand of consumption will require
three quarters of million bales more than we
can produce with our present labor and its
regular and customary increase up to that
time /; and at the end of the next decade our
production, under existing circumstances, it
will fall short of the demand four millions of
bales. We must either meet this demand
and remedy this efficiency, or suffer the per-
nicious and fatal consequences of it, In the
competition which it will inevitably engender
in successful production of the needed sup
ply in other parts of the world. We cannot
meet the emergency otherwise than by pro-
curing an additional supply of labor The
necessary amount of cotton production to sup
ply the demand for the year $780, would re-
quire an additional supply of slave laborers
over the number that, by the regular and GUS
tomary increase, will then be found in the cot
ton States, of some forty to fifty thousand, and
the deficiency at the end of the next ten years
will amount to more than half million
Where is this indispensable increase of our
slave labor to come from, except from Africa ?
Shall we have it, or, by failing in the vital un-
dertaking, which is the great industrial mis-
sion of these Southern States of supplying
commerce with the bulk of cotton which it
requires, expose our present brilliant prosperi-
ty to the certainty of ultimate and speedy
prostration ?