The Plymouth weekly Democrat. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1860-1869, 1867-09-05

For several years before the war the
people of the cotton and sugar States of
the South, finding their greatest profits il
the cultivation Of those products, gave to
that their entire industrial force, and
looked to the North for their provisions.
The result of this practice was to furnish
to the corn and wheat-growing States of
the North, and particularly of the West,
the best possible market for their surplus
of every description. The effect of this
upon the latter was a state Of unexampled
prosperity. The agricultural interest ex-
tended itself, opening new lands and ap-
plying new processes; and cities and
towns increased rapidly in wealth and pop
ulation. Enterprise and industry every
where met their appropriate reward; and
it was hard to tell to which of the two Sec
tions, the arrangement was the most bene-
| fetal.
One of the results of the new orier of
things introduced by the war is convic-
tion on the part of the people of the South
that, whatever else they raise, they must
raise their own provisions: that SO preca-
rious is the condition Of their Industrial
system that it will not do to neglect the
cultivation of food upon the plan of pur-
chasing the necessaries of life with tha
proceeds of that which they may not sue
ceed in bringing to a marketable perfcc-
ton They find no natural impediment to
the growing Of wheat aBd corn aud the
fattening OF pork anywhere; and while
the cotton crop are gloomy, there is pros
rect Of good supply Of the staple articles
Of provision
What effect this change in the direction
Of Southern industry will have upon the
people of those Northern and Western
States whose surplus has heretofore found
a market in the South, is question which
few years will decide To an industrial
people, the change of another industrial
people from consumers to that Of compet-
itors, is one that can not, in general, be
accounted propitious. A people, in order
to be prosperous, must not only produce
Il surplus, but that surplus must find some
other people for consumers, willing to pay
a profit upon its production.
We, the people of the North. have un-
doubtedly done several great things We
have been buSily engaged in vindicating,
aboishing, suppressing and restoring, and
all that sort of thing and have laid out
some money in political fine arts, returns
from which has not yet been received. We
have put the American eagle upon very
permanent footing, and have elevated Hai!
Columbia into an institution. We are sup
posed to have made ourselves respected at
home and feared abroad to have estab-
lished the Union upon an indissoluble ba-
sis, and to have fixed several principles in
Il mar rer very superior and satisfactory
In doing this We have had mankind FOX an
admiring audicnce-indced. we have not
been doing it so much for cur own sake as
for the sake Of the spectators-and for the
approval of the performance have appeal
ed with confidence to the judgment Of gen
crations yet unknown.
We suppose that the result of this which
will endure longest and come home to the
people Of the North and West most init
mately, is the fact that we have stopped
the mouths Of ten millions Of the eaters of
the surpl plus of our great stapl les of produc-
tion-storpcd them permanently. The
significance of this fact may not, at this
moment, be conlprchcnded; but is one that
will keep until there has been abundant
time to learn it by experience.
There are those Of cur fellow-citizens,
who really believe that our present abun1
dant crop, with perhaps one or two more
fruitful seasons, will enable us to pay off
our public debt, to reduce our taxation to
a mere trlhe, to bring about revival of
business, and to reinstate everything upon
the old basis of remuncra:ivc labor and
general prosperity We confess that we
can not see it. We do not discover, sim
ply in redundant crop, the elements OF Il
revival Nothing is 90 valueless as a sur
plus of food without consumer ready to
purchase at remunerative prices. We
destroyed our best customer We have
ldOnc our utmost TO ALLEVIATE our ouly other.
We can not produce wheat and corn and
pork at the same rates as formerly. The
cost of living, and every species of taxa
ton, direct and indirect, enter into the
cost of staples OF production. 1t is
doubtful whether, under any probable for
cgn demand, our leading agric caltural ar
ticles can be produced at prices which will
admit of exportation. The eastern mar
ket will absorb but a small portion Of the
western surplus, and wheat from Arknan-
sas, Alabama, and California, and perhaps
from abroad, will meet wheat from Ohio
and Indiana in the eastern markets. At
home the consumer can not afford TO pay
high prices, nor the producer afford to ac-
cept low ones Therefore it is that we af-
firm that we do not see the elements Of
that revival of business which some are SO
prone to discover Gin. Eng.
Tennessee laws VS.. Negroes.
In Tennessee they have law like that
in every other State, which requires men
To work certain time on the roads and
IL