The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1861-05-14
Our Resources for the War.

Onr Resources for the War.
A foolish idea prevails At the North that the
South cannot raise her own provisions, and
will starve outright if the war be kept up
The idea is born Of HELPER aud is only type
Of a class of ideas on this subject by which the
North is most industriously deludipg itself
The Census tables show that the South raises
moro provisions per man than the North, and
nearly as much as tho great grain growing re-
gion Of the West. Tho statistics Of the country
also show that the Eastern manufacturing free
States consume an equivalent Of all the surplus
products Of tho Western free States and that
the free labor North, taken unit, ex-
ports little or nothing abroad. The gold of
California and about twenty five millions of
miscellaneous truck constitute the sum total of
Northern cxportati ms of Northern growth and
production. The surplus provisions of the
Western free States are nearly consumed by
the Eastern manufacturing free States
The whole exports of tho late Union,
with the exceptions we have stated
went from the South. If Western grain
went off from New York, it was but
little in excess of the quantities of Southern
provisions cent to Northern manufacturers. IT
was liberated by virtue of tho receipt of South
ern provisions, end really represented only an
export surplus furnished by the South. With the
exceptions stated the whole expectation of the
late Union, amounting to over three hundred
millions year, went from the South, of which
cotton alone furnished one hundred and nine
~. 81
millions se1t by the South abroad, she
sent al.o to the North about one hundred and
fifty millions of dollars worth of produce, cot
ton furnishing of course the largest item of the
amount. Considering the North az foreign
country, the exports Of tho South, in time Of
peace, are four hundred and fifty millions
year.
This is the largest expectation for the ratio
of population ksown in she commerce of the
world. If the surplus gifts products sent abroad
measure the wealth of country then is the
South, the number Of its population being con-
sidered, the weslthiest country in the
world. Yet the North deludes itself with
the belief that the South is weak. poor. and
On the point Of starvation. A country purely
agricultural; country of prolific soil and al
most prurient vegetation; country with the
best organized system of labor on the globe;
country exporting four hundred and city mil
lions of dollars worth of surplus products q |
year; that country poor, weak and stinted for |
food! What follies and stupidities are section
aprejudice capable of leading people into!
This hallucinaton has its origin in the fact |
that many Of the Southern planters contiguous |
70 the great rivers purchase their corn and ba- !
con. They purchase because the same hand |
who would raise one hundred and fifty dollars |
worth OF corn raises four hundred and fifty |
dollars worth of cotton or sugar. The plan
ter, therefore, who purchases, and who in
creasos to that extent the product of his cotton or
sugar crop, nearly doubles tho value of the la
Dor he employs in the substitution.
But how fallacious is the inference, that be-
cause few Southern planters, on the great
highways, purchase corn and bacon, therefore
the whole South will sterve, if cut off from
trade with the pork and corn raising States of |
the Union. The very fact of war, and isola-
ton from these latter States, at once makes the
S"usu lno gldhueSt growing region |
In the world. The very moment her sales Of
cotton are checked, that moment does she turn
her unexampled productive energies to the
cultivation Of provision stuffs; and from being
an exporter Of cotton, sugar, tobacco, rice, and
naval stores, she becomes even a greater grain
producing region than the great Northwest
herself. At any moment she chooses-such is
the advantage which her labor system gives
her--she can drive the Northwest out of the
provision markets of the world.
In this aspect of the case, the blockade of
the South will prove as serviceable to her as
prejudicisl to the North. If the South should
plant no cotton for year, she would get as
much for the cotton crop she held over as she
would have got for two regular crops. If in
that lapsed year of cotton, she devoted her
whole labor to the raising of grain, she would
have quantities which would supply all the
markets Of the world, and close them against
the North. IF the blockade could be enforced.
and her cotton could BIO confined to the South
no ultimate disaster would befall our section;
while ruinous competition in provision stufs
would be built up against the North. In no
manner can tho South be disastrously affected
BY this war; in every manner will the North be.
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