The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-02-07
POLITICS AND SOUTHERN INDUSTRY.

ern journey. His style is refreshingly free
from professionalism, and his letters are
marked by vivacity and a candor that would
render them admirable specimens of news
paper correspondence, were his Impressions
his deductions, and his surmises not clouded
SO often with the prejudices of party and of
section. We quote the subjoined extract from
one Of several letters written by him from
this city:
| New Orleans, at this moment, is not doing more
| than one-fourth of the business it transacted in
ante.war times Its merchants curse Congress
| for their troubles. The planters curse Congress
| for bad crops and worse regulated labor. Nearly
| all secretly sigh for the good old days" of
slavery, of which system about all they think they
] can remember s the banjo and the negro refrain.
| Nearly all pray Tor tho accession OF the Demo-
| cratic party to power. But will that party be
able TO revive the "Unon as it was" either in fact
or semblance' Can that party SO regulate negro
labor that il will cost nothing but coarse clothes
| and food while the planter rolls in money and
| governs the country as Of old? The re.enslave-
ment of four mil ions Of serfs once set free aud
advanced to the right Of suffrage, will be soms-
! thing quite novel in history.
II the Southern people expect their golden age
| 10 return, they should by this time be too wise to
look for it through the agency OF the Democratic
| party. When did they trust il without humilia-
| ton and disappointment? The planter has graver
! enemies than the FOrtieth Congress. One of his
bitterest is his conviction that while he must eat
the whitest and most savory bread, the inferior
| race" must do all the peTspiring. IL a Northern
| farmer has thin crop and manages his help so
badly that it costs more than IL produces, II sell
! dom strikes him to damn radical Congress for
| bis management. nor does he look to a change in
the administration to manure his fields and keep
him supplied, free of cost, with the most approved
agricultural implements. Ne matter what party
rules, the Southerner must learn that as long as
slavery does not exist, he must put his own
shoulder q wheel p he
amasses sufficient capital and knowledge to pay
others TO do the work. The lands here are as
rich rs ever, and the muscle as plenty. The new
system of labor is simply hunting its levels, and
the policy Of Congress, questionable as 1t is 10
some respects, does not alter the conditions Of
the case. The causes Of failure are OF different
nature. such as the army worm and Southern
leziness.
The above is a curious tumble of naive
prejudice, absurd reasoning and profitable
suggestion. The writer fancies that our mer-
chants and planters are incensed with Con-
gress for not having better regulated negro
labor, and that they desire the return to power
of the Democratic party in the hope that this
party will regulate that labor more to their
satisfaction. He entirely misconceives the
case. Our merchants and planters want no
interference with the labor question either by
a Democratic Congress or Republican Con-
gress Nor have they the least thought of the
revival Of the "Union as it was in the sense
of restoring either the fact or the semblance of
negro slavery. They are well aware that the
mere transfer of the government to the Demo-
cratic party could not bring back their golden
age. They know that there are industrial,
moral and social conditions of material re-
cuperation which must, in the end, adjust
themselves upon the basis of an established
change, independently of party platforms and
Of governmental policies What they ardently
desire is, that room may be at once given for
this normal and wholesome process of self
adjustment to begin and to go on to its legiti-
mate results. Why they detest the policy of
Congress is, therefore, plain. That policy
has persistently set its face against spon-
taneous development Of the elements of ma
terial prosperity in the South. It has been
vexatious intruder and a persistent disturber.
Our merchants and planters, consequently,
pray for its overthrow, and for the accession
of the Democratic party, from which they
would apprehend no intrusion or disturbance.
"If Northern farmer" says the cores
pendent of the Cincinnati Commercial, "has
thin crop ard manages his help so badly
that it costs more than it produces, it sell
dom strikes him to damn radical Congress
for his mismanagement," etc. He means by
this that the Southern planter has failed only
by mismanaging his help, and that he damns
Congress for the failure and looks to the &C
cession Of the Democratic party to power for
direct and substantial reparation. The boot
is on the other leg. The fact is that the
Southern planter has not been allowed to
manage his own help. Congress, through the
freedmen's bureau, has Invested him of that
privilege, and now he is held responsible for
the ruinous consequences of this interference.
At the same time that this correspondent
blames Southern laziness" with the present
untoward state of Southern agriculture he
admits that the products of this agriculture
were four times greater when it was controlled
by Southern whites, than they are now since
this control has ceased. The agricultural stu
alton is now for the most part at the mercy of
a radical Congress and its negro wards; and,
as a consequence, agricultural industry has
diminished to one-fourth Of its former pro-
ductiveness. Hence, it is clear that it is not
the Southern whites who have inaugurated a
regime of laziness.
We agree that there are many things connec-
ted with our material welfare which the best Of
governments at Washington could not do for
us if it would, and which it should not do for
US if it could. The use of good government
in respect to such matters is that, if it does no
positive benefit, it precludes a bad govern
ment, which would do much positive in
jury
Inreminiscences of the poet Halleck. Mr.. Jas.
| II. Hackett gives some charming "reminiscences Of
| himself " In the year 1919, and while | was
under the age of twenty years, 1 became charmed