Pointe Coupee Democrat. [volume] (False River [i.e. New Roads], Parish of Pointe Coupee [La.]) 1858-1862, 1860-12-15
Southern Productions.

| ton organs and orators of the North to
assert that the South is not sclf.sustain-
ing in the matter of breadstuffs and the
other necessares of life. They declare
that it the South Withdraw from the
Union, her people will starvc if the
Northern and Western States choose to
withhold their corn, wheat, potatoes and
other agricultural productions which
constitute the food upon which they
live.
This assertion any rejecting and i'll
telligent man will know to be incorrect.
But, if there be any doubt upon the sub
ject, it is only necessary to refer to the
official statistics embodied in the census
returns for 1850, to place the question
beyond all dispute or cavil.
We have before us table of the pro-
ductions of the fifteen Southern States
for the year ls49, in the two articles of
Indian corn and wheat. which shows
that these States produced, at that time,
more of these than was needed for their
own consumption. According to this
table, the production of Indian corn in
the fifteen Southern States was nearly
three hundred millions of bushels
would allow to every man, woman and
child i'll the South, white and black, an
average of about thirty bushels of coru
a year. This is more than enough to
supply breadstuffs to all. But, in addi-
tion, the South produces over fifty mil
lions of bushels of wheat. She produces
rice, fruits, potatoes, sugar, aud other
valuable articles Of food Aud this, too,
when her production in cotton, tobacco,
hemp, and other articles not necessary
for the sustenance of life, are worth to
her, in the markets of the world, hund-
reds of millions of dollars besides. ;
The South, even at the present day,
raises more cereals than are required to
feed her people. If necessary, she could
produce five times as much as is needed
1t is true, some Of the Southern States
of the Mississippi valley draw some of
their supplies of breadstuffs from the
Northern States of the same valley-but
we undertake to say that the amount is
less in quantity than is annually export
ed to New England and New York, from
the Southern States Of Maryland, Vir-
ginia and North Carolina, to say moth
ing Of the export from these same States
to South America, to Cuba, and to the
Of the old world, in England
and France.
Equally capable is she of providing
oeef, pork, and everything else that CON
'titutes the principal food Of her popula-
ion, outside of bread. The States of
Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Mis-
'ouri, Arkansas and Texas could supply,
t necessary, enough to feed the whole
South, if not another State were to raise
. bushel Of breadstuffs or pound of
mat. And the idea that we are depend
entor these things upon Ohio, Indiana,
ll''n'l' etc, is simply preposterous. If
we y favebouglit such things there be.
[ofc, u wa. merely a matter of conve.
nlencc. We preferred to concentrate
our labor in tlieoroducton of cotton and
sugar-bnt, it it we're necessary, only a
small portion OF tina labor would be re-
luired to produce evwythinr we might
need for the support o. life, and in the
boSt aDuHudut QuaHt'tleS.a
The tables we have refe-ed to arc
rom tle census returns of lSO. The
'eturns for the present year will,how a
vast increase, within the last ten ,,ars
If our product of breadstuffs. We mIl,t
Increase it, if we chose, almost indeh
litely.
Thus, then, while we produce plenty
% live on, within ourselves, we have
cotton, tobacco, hemp and other things
o spare; and the whole world--not the
North alone--for market The pros
,erity of nation, like the prosperity of
Nj individual, depends upon what is
saved at the end of the year, after sup
,lying all wants. This it is which gives
he South SO great an advantage. What
las the North to export? Some bread
'tuffs, it is true-tIlough in the South
American and Cuban markets, and in
australia, it is notorious fact that
Virginia -four will fetch from a dollar to
wo dollars barrel more than flour
made in Ohio or Western New York.
;ut off the South from the North as u
market for manufactured goods, and let
he cotton States buy breadstuffs from
tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, and
Iirgiiiia; and what would become of
he boasted power and wealth of the
North?
We do not cxult over the prospect of
hese things coming to pass. We are
orry, only, that Northern fanaticism has
orced the South to take care of herself,
as well as politically.
The spectacle of the prostration of the
manufacturing and shipping interests of
he North is one which the South will
'ot willingly look upon-but if they
hoose to bring it on themselves by
anatical warfare ,,pon an institution of