Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1875-05-15
cRAsaEas AND TOBACCO.

CHANGERS AND TOBACCO.
We took occasion, week or two
since, to suggestto the Tobacco Council,
the wisdom of adopting measures tor
rrorating, among the Changers, the area |
each should plant in tobacco. We did |
this with little expectation of accom-
plishing the desired object, because
such an arrangement can be effected
only by mutual consent, and any at
tempt at authoritative interference
with the rights of the farmers to cut
their throats, if they choose, will give
rise to mischievous disccra. Our sole
motive, in making that suggestion, was
to advance the interest of agriculture,
the individual and collective prosper
ty of those whose daily vocation IS the
cultivation of the soil. We looked al
the cotton States, and saw their power
ty has been, annually, increased under
the false idea that, to raise cotton, IN
the greatest possible quantity, was the
high road to wealth, and believing that
the same disastrous failure must attend
exclusive attention to any single staple.
We called the attention Of the Grangers
10 the dangerous risk and suggested
the means of guarding against it. In
vcstisation had also satisfied US that
tie markets of the world are over
stocked with inferior grades of tobac-
co; that the present high prices are
due, not to scarcity of the staple, but
the great dearth of that which Is good
that the on'y means whereby paying
prices can be maintained for the crop
now in preparation, is that each pro-
Queer shall resolve, at once, TO plant no
more than he can cultivate in the
most thorough manner, protect against
worms and handle in the neatest style.
Next season, none but fine articles of
tobacco will command corresponding
prices, whilst the probable addition of
a large supply of inferior grades to the
stock on hand, can have no other ten
dency than to depress the price of the
highest grades. In this way the farm
erwho works for quality be seriously
damaged by his neighbor who goes for
quantity. Aud hence the necessity for
concert of action, to be based upon the
hypothesis that present high prices
can only be maintained by superior
quality. 1t costs as much to.raise low
Tugs and inferior leaf, as the same
weight of superior article, and farm
ers will find both economy and profit
in limiting their efforts to quality
rather than quantity.
1t is not yet too late to increase the
area of corn, and the experience of
the past winter, present spring and
coming summer ought to leach the i'm
portance of providing against future
failures of this vital crop. There is
little likelihood of raising too much
corn, even if large portion of the
land intended for tobacco, be now
planted with that cereal. \ large
amount of pork will be required for
the next season, and the decrease in
the number Of hogs must be compen-
stated by the greater weight of those to
be fattened. But little reflection is
required to convince any sensible man
that corn, in the shape of fat hogs and
cattle, always pays better than inferior
tobacco, to say nothing of its greater
contribution to the comfort and pros
perity Of communities.
We have been led to believe that a
principal object of the Grange move
ment is to secure such concert of ac-
ton as will enable farmers, not only
to protect themselves against the efforts
of combinations of capital to control
the price of farm products, as well as
hostile legislation, but to develop
their own interests through such a sys-
tenn of cultivation as will so adapt
production to supply and demand as to
insure, at all times, liberal compensl
ton for their labor. If their zeal in
behalf of their vocation, can not
secure unanimity on this important
point; if there is to be no discipline iD
the Order, by which systematic action
can be secured in furtherance of re-
form and Misrepresentation Offalse
theories and m;schievous practices and
development in ali that pertains to L
prosperous agriculture aud enlighten-
ed citizenship-what does the Order
expect to accomplish for its own and
the general good? We do not expect
Changers to avert calamities inflicted
by natural causes, but we did expect
of them such 4 display of practical
wisdom as is needed to adapt the sup
ply TO the demand, so as to secure pay
ing prices for tabacco and cotton, es-
pecially as such policy will develop
economy in labor and soil. This view
of the subject is our apology for the
suggestion We made to the Tobacco
District Council but having no inside
view of the objects and workings of
the Order, we may be in error in sug-
costing a policy that may be totally at
variance with the purposes for which
it was organized. If so We desire to
be corrected.
Tue New York Herald is terribly
indignant at the lynching in Nashville,
of a cold-blooded aud diabclical muir
derer That paper is SO imbued with
the fiendish spirit of abolitioniSm, that