The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1870-06-09


RESOLUTION Memorializing Congress on
the subject of Reclaiming Overlooked
Lands on the Mississippi River,
Whereas, The Delta between the Missis-
sipDi and the Yazoo Rivers contains an
immense body of land unsurpassed in rich
ness and because of these further consid-
erations- viz:
That those lands lie at the very heart of
the American Cotton zone. That while the
richest of the cotton uplands do not yield
an ay erage of half bale to the acre, the
lands lying between the Mississippi and the
Yazoo yield an average per acre of full
bale; That with the exception of some tracts
found scattered through it at level above
ordinary floods, the agricultural industry of
the country had been excluded from that
luxuriant waste by foundations of the
Mississippi;
available for settlement under that state of
the case been settled before 1850, that the
five river counties which produced $4,000
bales of cotton in that year. had produced.
even ten years previously so many as $4,000
bales;
That the Government of the United States
seeking to convert the immense areas Of
rich lands which had remained thus useless
into an element of wealth granted them TO
the State of Mississippi in trust for their
reclamation by levees.
That the following statement will show
the results of that grant on the production
of the five counties already referred to:
In 1910. before the grant, the counties be-
ing unlevied, $4,000 bales
In 1850, before the grant, the counties be-
ing still unlevied, $4,000 bales.
In 1860, after the grant, the counties hav-
ing been levied, 10000.
That the policy of promoting the con-
struction Of the levees of the Mississippi by
resources of the Federal Government, is
seen thus TO have been proved sound in our
public arithmetic, for the luxuriant lands
which had remained for the decade previous
to the grant by the United States, unculti-
waited wastes had in ten years after the con-
version Of the grant added to the commerce
of the country 1I4,0O0 bales Of cotton. to the
income of the country Five Millions of Dol
lars.
And whereas, Previously to the grant for
the reclamation of the lands contained be-
tween the Mississippi and the 1aZoo, those
lands had remained on the hands of the
further considerations, viz:
That from the day on which the donation
made by the Government had given an as
surance of their reclamation they became
valuable I'm the market that their sale VEL
ded thenceforth large sums OF money; and
that the investment Of these sums In the
construction of levees had made the land
thus sold an available basis of credit for the
completion of the work.
That after the conversion of the Federal
donation, after the exhausting OF local tax
alton and local credit, the people who had
gone into the alluviums Of the Yazoo I'm ex-
pectation of the final success of the recla-
nation, found themselves, as body corpo-
rate, on its accomplishment not only without
further resources at their dlspOral but also
in debt 70 capitalists at the North and the
South 10 the last limit of their powers OF
payments
And whereas, Bringing home to them the
disasters Of the war under 3 form OF special
hardship, military necessity demauded that
the great Improvement IN whose construc-
ton the people or the delta had become ut-
terlr exhausted, be destroyed and because
of4hese luther considerations, viz: = -
| That notwithstanding its wonderful pro-
dnctfveness as field for cotton the country
/ lying between the Mississippi and Yazec
| has, as q, result Of the war, reverted back
| 10 substantially the condition Of waste from
which nc had been reclaimed; and that che