The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1872-02-22
The Cotton of India Considered as n
Competitor 10 Our Own,

The Cotton of India Considered rs n
Competitor 10 Our Own.
| Editor DemocI attic Statesman:
In the commercial and industrial
history of nations, it is curious to
watch how natural advantages,
though temporarily retarded 10 their
action from extraneous causes, PER-
petually reassert themselves.
Our beautiful South, ravaged and
depopulated by the long war, bank
rupt in money, bat not in spirit and
enterprise, and rasnaged, for a long
period as conquered provinces, had,
to yield for time the supremacy of
supplying the world with cotton.
The impulse to the production of cot
ton in other parts of the world we
pointed out last week.
We showed how Brazil, Peru, AL
geria, Turkey, Egypt, China and
India thrOve by our misery; how in
diViduals and corporations made sure
to hold in a firm grasp the golden
treasures of our national industry.
A comparatively brief period, how
ever, gave US back our wanted i'm
portance, and though we may not
perhaps be determined so completely
as formerly to rule prices in foreign
markets, yet we have resumed the
lead again in the worlds supplies,
and mean to hold it with the firm
grasp of perseverance, combined
with capital and intelligence.
Of all the cotton producing coun>
tries, India was most iniuriously af-
fected by this readjustment of the
scales of trade, and although India
received, in one year, over $780,
100000 in gold for cotton, these fig
ures have declined materially every
year since, and grow lower every
year with the reduction of the area
planted in cotton.
Why is it that India, with her
cheap labor, rich lands, foreign and
domestic capital, can not compete
with US in the production of cotton?
For this simple reason, that the mil
lions of inhabitants left the produc-
ton of corn for that of cotton.
This difficulty of cheap food for
cheap labor presented itself in such
a form that a most formidable famine
depopulated the whole districts in
which cotton, and no rice, was raised.
One of two things, therefore, must
happen. Either India must grow
more corn and less cotton-and in
that case her competition as cotton
producer becomes smaller with every
acre the people plant Lessor the
railroad system, and by that we mean
cheap railroads must be SO extended
from the cotton districts to the land
which supplies the food.
In justice to the English, as we'll
as native merchants, we must say
that they are alive to the interest of
the cotton trade, and the gold they
realize from it, and they therefore try
to extend their lines of railroad, and
in many instances double old lines.
For the present lines of railroad are
entirely insufficient for the carrying
of cotton and grain, and it did hap~
pen that loaded trains of grain were
stopped in the interior, where the
famine was at its highest.
No other city of India prospered
so much as Bombay by this over
production of cotton. Bombay has
achieved enormous wealth by it, and
strives hard not to forego its advan-
tages. 1t was a sudden rush of gold
and silver into the emporium of
Western India, and wealth realized
from cotton became concentrated in
comparatively few hands.
Of course, when cotton can be
turned so rapidly into gold, there is q
temptation to neglect other produce,
and by its neglect cotton diminishes,
and becomes dear.
We have seen the same results in
our own country the last season.
1t is, perhaps, well to mention in
this connection that the produce of
India yields only one-seventh of
bale of lint cotton per acre, or in
round figures one bale of cotton of
400 pounds from seven acres of land.
This fact alone is sufficient to prove
the inability of India to compete sue
cessfully under normal circumstances
with our own industry.
A lesson can be learned from this
race after gold from cotton, and it is
this: Let our farmers give every at
tention to the production and i'm
proyement of cottnn- Int lat II mt he