The New Orleans bulletin. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1874-1876, 1874-07-05
SENSIBLE REFLECTIONS.
Editor New Orleans Bulletin:

I Mr.. EtuOr-lhe columns OF nearly every
city paper that meets my eye, contains some
alusion to the large number of persons in
New Orleans that can obtain no employment,
and the pictures drawn Of the Institution and
want, resulting from such deplorable state
Of affairs are narrowing in the extreme. 1t is
indeed hard that men able to work, willing,
anxious to do so, should have their hands tied
as it were their daily bread denied them,
through inability to find something to do.
| A State has indeed come to gloomy pass
when energy and thrift, within her borders,
are Of no more avail to their possessors, than
| idleness and profligacy.
But is such the case? Have we, in good
| truth an overcrowded population? Is our
commerce so decayed, our industries so para
lyzed and Frustrated as really to be incapable
Of affording employment to even the indus
trious and deserving of those among us ?
Must it 60 forth to the world that New Or
leans-that Louisiana alike the idle
and the industrious, or rather that she intlicts
upon both the same punishment-a common
lot of in the quagmire OF misery and want?
If all this be so, then, in the name of COM
mon humanity, let's have truce to all our
much-talked-of immigration schemes. If we
are already on short rations, for mercy's sake
don't try to increase our numbers merely to
make our pittances less rather let all our
eloquence and efforts be devoted to inaugural
ing grand exodus OF every man, woman and
child, to some far distant, but more generous
clime-to some favored spot where at least
- the laborer will be worthy of his hire, and
leave our worn and worthless State to the rule
and occupancy of alligators and carpet
baggers.
Now this is all wrong Apart from those
who are sufferers by the flood, there should
not be single pinched stomach, nay, not
oven an empty purse among us ALL even were
our number fourfold what it is. Business in
New Orleans is dull, but, in spite of all the
croaking, there is ample occupation there to
afford a decent support to every one OF her
legitimate population. The trouble is that
the country is crowding itself into your linn
it's The planters son must needs become
merchants clerk, and the field hand drops his
hoe and leaves his pillow to ply the cotton hook
upon your wharves, or launch the
stage from some Of your numerous river
craft. The result is, the country is being
abandoned city crowded to very I'M
healthy rep letion. This l hold in great
measure, is the cause OF much of your suf-
fering; yes, and even Of your crime-for men
must eat, they will not starve even though
they have to steal. What, then, is the rem
edy? Give us back our negroes and our
planters sons-your surplus population-and
you Cdu UucA Wcu OAC OdAACe. 1ou
will be parting with what you do not want, We
be acquiring that of which we stand sorely in
need.
How can this be done? you say. How
bring about the reform proposed? l admit
am at loss to advise. l can merely hint at
the evil, and if evil it be, trust to the public
spirit of some one of more ability and promi-
hence than myself to propose the remedy for
its removal. OF course, every person has the
right to choose the place Of his residence and
the kind of the occupation he prefers to pur-
sue SO no law or enactment could be made to
reach the case but 1 think if your steam
boatmen, stevedores builders and public Off
Gals, in selecting their workmen, would
engage white men exclusively-of which l
dare say there are more than enough Offering
to supply their wants-it would considerably
tend to make the colored men seek employ
lnent on plantations, it would at least keep
many who are there now from leaving.
In thus wishing to induce the colored por-
ton Of your residents to remove to the country.
do not wish to be understood as rejecting in
the least upon the fair fame Of the negro char
acter, by implying that they are not as well
qualified for the occupations named as the
white men, for whom l advise preference
shown. The distinction l draw is far from be-
ing an invidious one, and l hope that none of
your stalwart colored youths will SO far mis-
construe my meaning, as to call me to account
for what have written. We may compare the
inhabitants of our State to an army-tO an
army struggling for existence, for daily bread.
The farmers the field hands, the tillers of the
soil, We may say are our infantry, and the
jewellers i'll our cities, our cavalry.
Now in the battle before rs if we find our
cavalry force larger than we can effectually
use, and our infantry columns wofully thin,
it is but good generalship to dismount some of
our troopers and put in their hands muskets
to shoulder, instead Of losing their services by
allowing them to WELD useless swords. In
counseling that the negroes be dismounted, I
am not instigated by the fear that they are not
as well capable Of managing a charger as white
men, but because l think they will make bet
ter infantry, at short notice, than they. Our
forces are small we must husband every man
Of them. l wish to see old Louisiana win in
this contest out of it covered all over
with prosperity and plenty. l wish to
see New Orleans the proudest, finest
and richest city in the land, her
wharves groaning under the treasures of the
West, and her skies black with the smoke
of domestic and foreign steamers. wish her
draymen to be as merchant princes are else
where, and the wealth of her merchants to be
rs countless as the sands Of the sea. All this
do I wish; but even more do / wish to see our
fertile fields again brought into cultivation,
and the products of our soil increased to ten
fold what they are-in fine, l wish to see the
sugar region of Louisiana become what the
hand of Providence seems to have destined it
to be-the garden spot of America, the sugar
bowl of the United States; but to do all this
we want our colored fellow-citizens in our
fields. Respectfully,
STUBB L. CANE.
Happiness.