The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1871-06-13

evils Of the place. They are not, however, gildcd
Saloons sacred To faro-merely little dark, wooden
houses which you enter through the back door OF q
grocery, ana where you can play POKER and old
sledge such is the county seat OF Rutherford. which
has u population OF about 10000 people, VINO are,
with scarcely an exception, farmers ana planters.
Before the war RHtherordt0n was, Tor us size,
very wealthy, but II IS now
UTTERLY IMPOVERISHED.
In asking the cause OF It's present poverty You VIII
stumble upon the first CRYING evil IN Its body polite.
yet pecuniarily recovered from the war p,
Various replies will be made. Some will assign
politics as the principal cause but the most common
and The truest aud most sensible response will he
that the drained the country OF ali iUs capital OF
every knd-eit II almost entirely without money or
CATTLE or even provisions. Worse than this 1t dnan
cialiy elt every prominent man-every man VINO
had previously conducted the industry OF the coun-
try-in state far below Insolvency. Every man
had lost whatever he had except the OF fertile
earth that the rebel oflcals could not impOund
the Yankees carry away. We all remember how
largely Southern business was formerly done upon
credit. The traders gave long bills to the
Wholesale merchants In the North, and the
planters, with mortgages upon their estates and
nlggers, and OF extiavagant personal habits. ran
neadlong into debt to the storekeepers. Estates
have declined TO third or their former value; the
negroes have been spirited away by the dull but
meaning verbage OF the Proclamation OF Emancipas
ton; the stock or the soreKeeper carried OF by
couple OF armies The mortgages and debts, how
ever still remain and hang like financial mlstOaes
round the necks OF all unfortunate debtors. Lest
they should be wiped out special legislation has
taken ont The years or the war from under the In.
huence OF the statute OF limitation.
UNIVERSAL THOUGH LATENT, BANKRUPTCY
IS the result with universal lawsuits rs an almost
equally necessary consequence. No sooner does
man make little cash than he Is set upon by
dozen OF his neighbols. who hold his paper OF per-
pockets to he themselves despoiled in turn in the
same way. by general consent men are rarely sold
up, a TACT which speaks well Tor The humanity as
well as the honesty or the people; but for five long
years all the ready money In the country has been
making the rounds between the pockets OF the
debtors anG creditors OF the days before the war.
pauSlng generally, by the way, az the Court House,
and wasting in bulk by legal manipulation. This
state OF alairs has been aggravated by a custom
when was formerly very common at the South, as
II Is in all countries where long credits are an
tablshed usage, the custom or q man getting his
friends TO be
SECURITY FOR THE PAYMENT
Of bis debts. In old times, when every one was
called upon to make. good the guarantees he thus
made. Merchants In good standing carelessly
scratched their names on the back OF their GUS
toners paper, as though 1t cost them nothing. in.
vo!ved no risk and was simple form OF friendship.
There are plenty OF men here who have no idea at
all of The sums for which they are thus possibly
sponsible only couple OF days ago gentleman
told me that claim OF this character Tor several
hundred dollars was presented TO HIM, which had
dent long ago cancelled, for 1t had been made
before the war, but now, Just as he was
particular sum sorely to carry on a rail.
road contract he had undertaken, 1t came 10
the front 10 once more embarrass him. Never be-
fore, should imagine was a community so hope
lessy tangled NJ In pecunlary Gordan knot. NO
body knows what he is really worth, and If debtors
lands and real estate We're sold at their current
value most people would be found to be worth
good deal less than nothing. majority OF the
prominent citizens nave for Ave years been thus
like Sisyphus, their stone OF debt up the lil until
they nave nearly reached the summit or freedom,
and then been Knocked down to the bottom again 10y
some newly discovered obligation. MANY OF them
have told me that II they had had any idea thai
w9u Wona at az
abandoned all they had 10 their creditors ana begun
the world alresh.
GENERAL FINANCIAL MIDDLE
In which the district Is envelOped, because have
no doubt the same evil prevails ali over the South,
and 1t explains the fact that these unfortunate
States, IN spite OF the manly way In which many OF
their citizens have met their difficulties and IN
spite too, OF the money that has been poured into
item for cotton and produce. are recovering SO
slowly from the rum or the war. This Is one OF the
troubles OF tie south, that, though TAR more press
ing than the Ku klux question or negro suffrage,
has never fairly been Kept before Northern eyes.
ii Is, however, trouble which you hear OF hourly
when you know Southern man well enough 10 talk
o HIM about something else than politics. And 1t
Will press upon you al the more sadly and forclbly
when you further remember how honorably South
traders have endeavorcu to clear OF their scores
to Northern firms.
Until thus understood the situation l was guilty
first thing Yankee hears, as SON as he crosses
Mason and Dxons line, wherever his feet may stray
's' 1--WE want MEN OF CAPITAL
down here to develop the country; we can never
rise alone Tor generation nom the ue5tttutlon INTO
which we have been plungel.'
"Men OF capital, you reply, with Northern spirit;
'monsense! They ale all very well In their way
brains 10 plan and hands to work. Why don't you
do as the people in the new States IN the est have
donc-why don't you manufacture your own mil
lionnalres? Energy and industry are the only foun-
tains OF wealth. There are towns In the West, now
rich and prosperous, which never mad single set.
tier with thousand dollars TO his name. Put your
shoulder to the wheel and you VIII soon thrlve.o
When you have made some such speech as this
hob lafo hna
main silent. But "Good Heavens p he will say to
himself, "havent worked hard Haven't racked
my brains to make every dollar that my land could
produce? Haven't lived poorly, and my wife and
my daughters and myself worn old clothes, and my
sons kept home at work instead OF going to school
and college? And yet here am, In just ABOUT as
PECuNIARY DILEMMA
as was at the surrender" Perhaps. TOO, he may
add, with good deal OF reason also, 500 COG
.Tn Sc Internal lank sent down their blue coats
to ruin u.s. ana now they despise us because we are
poor"
The true reason, therefore, why the South does not
prosper Is that she Is grooming under an incubus OF
debt which seems almost immovable, and which, at
any rate II Will take years and years to roll away,
especially in the lace OF the heartless and wicked PEE
cuniary oppression OF the harpes into whose hands
Congress has colinded the state governments. Just
now when economy ought to be the primary object
OF humane rulers, the taxes are, as rule, three
four times what they were before the war; The moro
YOU study the question the more viii this pecunary
aspect OF southern dIicuilies grow upon you. only
yesterday / fairly shuddcrsd as heard that three
mon interest on good collateral out In this district
and even five per cent Is occasionally offered. Men
OF Wall stleet-you who paid halr per cent a day
for three terrible days last December-you at least
know well that forty 10 sixty per cent per annum
means
GENERAL RUIN.
Just realize the terrible strait of a man who Is
forced 10 thus commit harl-kari and financially dis
ENDOWED himself or else consent 10 see his lands
the last straw to which he clings in the nope of
brighter days-sOld away from him for taxes. 1t
would not nave taken very much 10 have provoked
sober business men IN New York to Ku Klux with
the and OF lamppost, the halt dozen greedy mil.
lonnares who last christmas locked up money in
the vaults OF the banks And scarcely THINK IL
would be polite Tor the men who for their own adj
vantage added millions to the public debt OF North
Carolina aud buried her beneath q load OF 0blIga-
lions heavier than she can bear; who dispensed Ier
ponds in New York houses OF ,ll-fame and swamped
the street with them at twenty-five cents on the
dollor--I do not think 1t would be polite
or prudent for them to come our here
IN inc backwo0ds. The Ku Klux have
now disbanded am told but some means OF ven :
geance might still be found, evcn by people so
orderly and peaceape and good-natured as the
people OF North carolina, to make them rue their
crimes. Oppression becomes ntolerabc In any
lxIlA