The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1873-03-13
From the Rural Corolinian for March.
Immigration and Labor.

No two subjects are discussed with greater
contrariety of opinion throughout the South
than those of Immigration and Labor. !mmi-
grafton! Why, many agriculturists dream
dreams of Golfers full as the result of turning
the tide Southwark from the Old World, every
immigrant being with them skillful laborer,
who has only to he imported to make our waste
places blossom as the rose.
And what of Labor? Why, nothing but
change the color Of the laborer's skin, and de-
preston bids adieu to the land, and the Sunny
South robes herself in the verdure of modern
Eden.
But Others believe the flow of immigration
stream of doubtful fertility, carrying along IN
its current muddy solution, that leaves pol
sonous, sediment; and advocate the existing
labor of the South as incomparably the best
for her. present employers. Many IFS and
"ands" can be attached to either of the two
positions.
The South wants population, but if that
population be people with more Drawn than
brain, we are better off without them. Labor
is not scarce enough in the South to demand
an influx of immigrants to supply the Dell
cheney. The South needs capital more than
laborers, and hence men of money, be their
funds pence or pounds, should be invited to
and settle amongst US; and all such who invest
in real estate should be met with welcome,
and offered an inGucement, come whence they
may. The simple hireling, with naught but
muscle to commend him, would be wiser to
stay away than to come. No day laborer can
compete with the negro in the employment OF
the former slave-cwner, or In the cultivation OF
Southern staples. The wants of the negro
laborer are a warm back and full belly
These supplied, ard he is capable of wonderful
endurance. The wants of the white laborer
are manifold, and sometimes cannot be sup
piled at the South. Fresh meat as daily diet
he requires and this cannot be had at all times
in summer. Sugar, coffee, flour, and feather
bed, are as necessary to his contentment, as
they are superhuities in the rations of the ne
gro laborer Every Southern born planter
knows these are fscts, and for this reason he
should depend upon the labor to which he has
always been accustomed.
Much complaint is urged against the negro,
because he is treaeherous and ungratefnl, and
idle, and worthless, generally. Be it so. His
is more than this. He is ignorant, and ne is
an inferior being to those amongst whom Prov
idence has cast bis lot Were this not so, we
of the South would owe him debt of graft
tude more valuable than freedom itself for his
docility. fathfulness and quiet, from 1861 to
1866. Imagine the position of the two races
reversed in those wears of strife and trial, and
who could have foretold the consequences?
But does any Southern planter know that
the hirelings of our own race are any less
treacherous, any usore worthy, or any more in
dustrious than the negro? The native born
whites who have lived to maturity without ac-
cumulating property in the past, will never do
so in the future, and as a class, are the most
Objectionable employees The better class OF
immigrants who come to America in search OF
happiness or wealth, seldom delay In the East
ern cities, but move directly westward where
Government lands can be bought for song,
or purchased for the "sqnatting;". and such
people generally make valuable citizens, and
add wealth to the country in which they settle.
But in their wake lows the tide of those hum
bier in life, who come here either because they
can or must come, and who are too ignorant to
have any definite purpose in view. They have
heard America was free country, and with
them freedom and license mean the same thing
The most worthless of this class generally exc
out an existence where they land, unless pinch
ing poverty drives them Southwark or to North
ern almshouses. Many of them, however,
move by fair means or foul westward, stopping
here for job, and there for week, ultimately
aiming to secure that "forty acres" without the
mule. which Uncle Sam has promised them on
his Western frontier. So constant and regular
is this westward current, that in many por-
tions of the North and Northwest, farm Ia
borers are exceedingly scarce, and ten-fold
more irreliable than our colored laborers. They
frequently engage for a month, payable weekly,
and at Saturday night, on receipt of the first
weeks wages, they bundle up and are off before
Sunday morning. This greatly discourages
planters, who though abundantly supplied at
the pitching, have but little idea whence is to
come the labor to cultivate the crops. "To set
up for myself" is the idea, and of course this
can only be done without money where lands
have no marketable value.
From one-ffth to more than one-half the
of several of the Northwestern
States are actual Immigrants, and wherever
these people have congregated in greatest
numbers wealth hes accumulated most rapidly;
for this reason mary superficial thinkers assert,
if we only had suca an influx southwark for
few years we woulG grow immensely wealthy,
and almost instantaneously prosperous Such
is not the case, however. A sudden increase
of population in community peculiarly agri-
cultural, where the staple product is food for
neither man ncr beast, would create an army
of consumers that would impoverish the land
and reyolutionize the entire system of agricul-
ture. Grain-growing and st0ck-raising coun-
tries can, therefore, be enriched by the same
process that would impoverish cotton coun-
try. Food being cheap, labor must be cheap,
hence the better means of building railroads,
establishing factories, exhuming minerals, and
otherwise developing the material resources OF
the country.
But had the South this incessant stream of
immigration we would be ruined. Cotton is
essentially tile product of the South, and in
these latter days experience has taught the
world, that the successful cultivation of this
crop is a science only appreciated by Southern
born planters and their former slaves. The
cultivation of cotton by immigrants, either for
themselves or as "helps" would result in fail
ure.
may be asked, do we not need immigrantsH
Most surely we do; but not such a stream, nor
generally such class as pours annually into
the Northwest We need those foreigners who
pot nnlu tnow how, IN work hIlt who will hrjnp