Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1876-03-31
FRIDAY MORNING, MARCH 81, 1875.
THE VINDIOAT0R FOR THE CAMPAIGN.

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the time paid for. No chance of subscrip-
ton bills being run up against anybody.
Postage paid by the proprietors.
OUR FARMS IN THE Wiley
There is one thing more important to us
in Virginia than all the political questions
of the day, and which seems harder to learn
than any other lesson that should have
been enforced by our experience and our
observation. 1t is that large landholdings
are grave hindrance to the prosperity of
country. We are almost inexcusable for
our dullness in this regard, and for the
way we hug this relic of slavery in spite of
the fact that the problem has been demon
strated and the blackboard wiped off by
fearful war, for us to commence afresh.
This generation is in full view of the dead
ly effect OF slavery on a grain-growing
country, and yet it clings tenaciously to
one of its peculiar features, so peculiar that
in no other state Of society is it tolerated.
With slavery it was a necessity. It was
imperative that the poorer white man, the
small farmer must move OIL be spread over
by the neighbor who owned his labor, and
whose yearly stock of laborers was en-
larged by natural increase. Yet now,
without this incentive, and when the cause
has long since violently passed away, our
landholders are engaged in spreading them
selves out with painful thinness over the
land. There are about one thousand land
holdings in Augusta of the size which are
recognized as farms. Of this one thousand
about one-fourth. are clear of all incum
brance, perhaps not so many, for farmer
the absolute owner of his land, stock, and
out of debt, is very rare thing, indeed;
and, putting aside all regulations of
wealth, and going to the bottom of the
matter, it would be hard to find two hum
bred and fifty men in Augusta who are the
clear owners of the land held in their
names. The temptation to buy, with IA
cility in purchasing, is too great. A man
with farm Of moderate size paid for, sees
twelve or fifteen farms up for sale, as was
the case at a recent court day here, and
chen, instead of rem embering that all his
labor and capital should be spent improving
the land he has, goes off and buys more.
The down payment is small and within his
reach, or he borrows it at twelve per cent,
and then gives his notes for the balance
with more interest. He yields to the temp
tation, and his chains are forged for years
to come. The man who in these days has
: farm of six hundred acres, with only one
hundred of it paid for, would save money
and time and trouble by giving the whole
of it away. But our people don't believe
in small holdings, and they have great
faith in the value of their lands. They are
told, with truth, that the same land that
sells in this Valley for $40 all acre sells in
Pennsylvania for $40, which is SO; but
they also believe that it is as much worth
$40 here as it is there, which is not SO.
The value of land does not depend alone
on it's soil. An acre of land ia Pennsyl
vania, with a teeming population, a con-
Stunning demand for what that acre can be
made to yield, and railroads crossing in
all directions to carry it to the consumer,
is worth ten times the money that it is in
our sparsely populated Valley. The density
of the surrounding population, as well as
the capacity Of the SOIL gives value to the
acre, and the. way to make it valuable is to
J gather population around it.
We do not do this in the Valley. On the
contrary, we congratulate ourselves i'll a
blind and foolish way about keeping up"
the price of our land, which, of course,
keeps out immigration. When we come
to ask how such piece of land came to
bring such price, we are told that it WAS
bought by the man whose farm it adjoined.
The very last man in the world who ought
vGou will see no evidences of thorough Gull
Itivation on it, no improvement of it, no
thrifty, careful look about it's manage
! ment, no evidence that it has yielded lis
owner enough to buy that adjoining farm.
If some enterprising, live young man. just
married, with his little savings had bought
1.-THE farm just sold, there would have beer
new life in the neighborhood, a new neigh
Dor and more population, increasing the
4yalue of the farms around him. But no
the old neighbor has bought it to add it to
the old farm, to be cultivated in the old
style, and to be paid for in the old harrass-
ing way. Nevertheless. there is rejoicing,
for it has brought the old price. The price
of land has been kept up, and the new man
with muscle, a fresh body, fresh mind,
fresh ideas, has been kept out by the old
price, and goes West. 1t is not the great
Fertility of the lands out West that carry
off these emigrants we see daily leaving
nd of 10
week. all hearty, healthy, valuable people
10 any cOmmunity--it is their cheapness.
paragraph in a letter to this journal last
week said that one of the fourteen emf
rants, a man with six grown sons whom
lie carried with him, had bought nine hun
red acres of land for the money for which
lie sold his farm Of two hundred acres in
his county. That farm was bought, you
see. by an old neighbor, and here we have
a family of eight vigorous, hearty, sensible
people moving for the accommodation OF
the old neighbors. 1t seems as if the
march Of the large landholder was almost
as destructive to the vitality of the county
Is that of the STAKEHOLDER, with whom he
Ras an ally, and from whom he got his
ypreading, but non-improving ideas.
Our farmers could learn lesson from city
4 lot spectators that would greatly benefit
mem. In a city, if a man owns ten unim-
owed lots, hewill sell every alternate one
the ter very cheap to good owners, and
hen they build, his five vacant lots are
orth fortune; but in the country, all
seem to go on the idea of owning ali around
them, and keeping the price of land up.
They CRY out against taxes. They are de-