Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1873-08-16
"wHAr TENNESSEE NEEDS.

The New York EUening Post tells US:
"What Tennessee needs to place il on q
level with the grain-growing States, and
what it appears now 10 desire, is more lit
era encouragement of industrial enterprises,
and a better appreciation of labor. By its
old narrow policy it repulsed emigration and
capital; by its Lew policy, corn Of the abo-
lition of slavery, it will invite them. The
State is just entering upon new era Of less
exclusive monopoly-and it is this, more
than any thing else, that will give it place
. among the great commercial communities. y
Can the farmers of Tennessee, or any 9TH
er class of its citizens, profit in any way by
the ideas and suggestions of a jOurG al
whose free soil notions are some years older
than those Of Mr.. Van Buren, and SiIas
Wright? In what way is the extinction Of
slavery "more than anything else to give"
our State "a place among the great en-.
mercial communities" We are told that
we should have "a better appreciation of
labor" When labor was highly appreciated
Tennessee farmers and planters had some
100000 colored people steadily and CON-
fortably employed in agricultural operations.
Now, by the overpowering force of free.
soilism, all these people appreciate labor
as they please, and everywhere
quit farms for cities and towns.
This wholesale desertion of farms, planta-
tons and all forms of tillage and husband
~ by some millions Of colored people in
the South, is the Posts "more liberal en-
enlargement of industrial enterprises, and
better appreciation of Ldborm Is it not
enough that the people of the South are
robbed of their property to the amount of
over two thousand million dollars for BE-
leviDg in the old doctrine of States rights
and that "the governing power should have
the COZ sent of the governed" that they
must be told what great thiags "the abo-
ltion of slavery" will on3 day do for them?
It is not possible for falsehoods of this
character TO do any good, it matters not
who proclaims them. The country slaves
in the State of New York had a chance to
educate their children in rural districts and
good homes On falms, when emancipated;
yet not one family in thousand of these
freedmen lived and died Whera they were
born. They all went to cities and villages,
and forsook the pow and the hoe. When
n Tthinrian ahan ely ar1I 10
leopard bis spots, then a low type OF
humanity in warm climate will
seek and appreciate" hard work.
In common planting operations, free negro
labor has been carefully tried forty years in
the British West India islands, and with
disastrous results, although both capital
and patience have be2u poured out like
wafer. So long as our Southern press CO.
pies and cOmmends Northern quRck nos
trums for Southern ailments, our condition
is likely to pass on from bad to worse. For
forty years Southern agriculture has been
dosed, and overdosed with this most iniu-
rious, officious, and often Off
cial medicine. The direct tax on
cotton was official by Congress.
Under one excuse or another, the South is
to be doctored to death, as time will demon
straie. Whatever drug is prepared for our
people, quite regardless of color, as part of
a relentless foreign domination, they must
open their mouths and swallow or be shot.
If the industrial classes of the South could
by any means, be persuaded to act together
in harmony, they might reap the benefits Of