The New Orleans daily Democrat. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1877-1880, 1877-11-10
RICHMOND AND NEW ORLEANS.

The city of Richmond, Va, has doubled he
population since the war. After the war sht
was mass Of ruins and her population was
composed chiefly of bankrupts and paupers
Bankrupts and paupers made 80 by the war
by the self-sacrifice and devotion of her noble
people to the Lost Cause In twelve or Afteer
years she energies from this desperate condi
zion into thriving commercial city, with 6
population of seventy-five thousand will
three hundred and thirty-one factories of al
Sorts turning out every product of art, from
d lucifer match to steam engine. The sales
OF her factories In 1876 reached the sum d
$22, 300. Her wheat and corn mills pro
duced $2,s 900, her forty-one tobacco facto
Fies 2,03S,3OO her iron works $1,000, 7s0; anc
the bonds of the corporation of Richmond are
par.
TO accomplish these marvellous results
Richmond has encountered those two great
obstacles, so much dwelt on in this city as
the principal difficulties to the increase and
development of New Orleans, to wit q
lamentable lack of capital, an oppressive
State debt and consequent burdensome taxa.
lion and several years of carpet-bag admins,
tration of the State government.
The population of Richmond, too, is more
+ largely Southern than that of New Orleans.
1t is common but unjust reproach of our
Southern born people, that they are deficient
in enterprise, energy and industry.
Let the progress of Richmond and Atlanta
during the last twelve years furnish the re-
mutations Of this SANDER. Their rapid adj
vancement against like obstacles and from
the same condition of ruin and devastation
aE our own, is due to the vigor and zeal with
which they have maintained their great arti-
ficlal agencies to transport produce from the
interior, and by their factories convert the
same into forms for expectation which quad
ripple the value of these raw products in the
markets OF the world.
Thus the tobacco product OF the whole
State, which In its crude state does not reach
the amount Of eight millions of dollars and
only a fraction Of which Is sent to Richmond,
Is by her forty-one factories converted into
manufactured article of the value of $12, O3S,-
300. In the production Of this new form of
this staple thousands OF laborers are en-
ployed.
Now, supposing that even fraction of our
ninety millions of dollars of cotton were
forms Of yarns, or coarse cloths, TRIPPING or
Guadrupling the value of the raw material the
wealth and population of New Orleans would
be necessarily correspondingly increased
Whereas the melancholy fact stares us in
the face, that the hitherto valueless seed
OF the cotton supplies the material for our
only thriving manufacture, whilst the lint
always the most valuable of our agricultural
products Is sent here to be forwarded else
where to be manufactured into the simplest
forms OF manufacture, thereby supporting
large populations In distant countries, and
giving employment here, for the purpose of
receiving and forwarding it, to population
only about equal to that of some OF the thirty
ing villages Of the West This, too in CITY
where We have the high testimony of the
vice president of the Central Illinois Railroad
for asserting there is more idle and cheap
labor and where the expenses of subsistence
are lower than in st. Louis, Chicago or Lou
isville.
Here then we have the conspicuous facts
and main causes Of the non-progress of New
Orleans We think we can safely assert that
through the factorage system of Richmond
her tobacco receipts of four or five millions
give employment to and subsist larger pop
ulation than can be supported by the handling
OF ninety millions of dollars of cotton. The
same is even more strikingly true of the hog
receipts of Chicago. Estimating her three
millions Of hogs to be of the value of twenty
millions Of dollars, and considering the innu-
merable processes through which this product
is passed, for expectation in the various
forms Of lard, picked pork, bacon, oil, can
dies, brushes, glue, ETC., we think it perfectly
safe to affirm that profitable employment is
secured in the manipulating of these twenty
millions Of dollars of hogs for four or five
times the number of our population who re-
ceive employment or subsistence from
handling the million and half OF bales of
cotton received in our port
Now, in view of these facts and examples, |
with what reason do we complain of our Sta
stionary condition, when we stubbornly per-
Sist In a course of direction and application
OF our vast natural advantages, which must
bar us from the methods and agencies
through which alone great cities can be built
up and march to prosperity and increase.
Without railroads into the interior to bring
the vast products of the country adjacent and
inviting us to come for the same, and without
facilities to convert these raw products into
more valuable and cheaply exportable forms,
we confess our great anxiety and apprehen-
sion whether New Orleans has yet entered
upon the path which she must tread ever to
reach the great destiny which kind Prov
idence has marked out for her.
The article we reproduce from the st. Louis
II g.