The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1877-05-24
SOUTHERN COTTON MANTFAC.
TURES.
@Ly the South can Successfully Complete
with New England in the JIaDfifaj.-
fure of Cotton

tUre of Cotton.
Baltimore Evening Bulletin. 18th
The last. and perhaps the most interest
ing, Of the able and instructive papers
on " American cotton" by Mr.. Edward
Atkinson, which have been published in
the New York Herald, IS that printed on
last Monday. 1t considers the subject of
cotton manufacture at the south, and
prOneUnces against the attempt to estab-
lish the industry there, believing that it
can only be successfully conducted in
New England. Mr.. Atkinson supports
his Judgment with an elaborate and
careful array Of those facts and figures
and comparisons which he knows so well
the value and use of, and reasons from
them in a very close and apparently con-
elusive way. We have read Mr.. Atkin-
sons paper with at least the attention it
deserves, and have been deeply impressed
with the force of much that he says.
We have not, however, been able to ar
rive at the conclusions to which he
comes, and we will endeavor to set forth
why not? Mr.. AtkinsOn's falIacy seems
to be more or less of the same sort as the
Nations fallacy, which we pointed out
yesterday in regard to the Turks and
Russians; that because things are not
done in the most scientific way, they
cannot be done at all. The Turks can
not defend their country, because they
have not the best arms and the finest
battaliOns. So Mr.. Atkinson says, with
uDdoubted truth, that cOtton-spinning
requires for its permanent success large
capital, a very few operatives. ample
banking facilities, thoroughly organ
lied system of distribution, machine
shop on one side and a paper mill TO
work up the waste on the other; but,
more than all, it requires habit and
training tor it, or other like occupations
in the mass of the community, and a
cool or cold climate, in which long hours
of persistent but not arduOUs indoor Ia
Dor can be sustained. Undoubtedly this
IS every bit true, As il applies to the
populations with which Mr.. Atkinson
has been in the habit of dealing. But
nevertheless, the view is not only a
oNE-sIDED VIEW
it is lal-e one. Take an illustration:
BY parity OF reasoning the manufacture
of -four can only be conducted IN the
great and costly mills of Minnesota,
where the water-pOwer, the processes, the
machinery, the operatives, banking tacili-
ties, means of consumption for waste,
system of distribution, etc, are all more
perfect than anywhere else. Why, then,
do not mills elsewhere stop, because
milling can be done cheapest in Mime
sofa? The Minnesota -four comes 10
Baltimore, to Richmond, to New York,
but the other merchant mills which sup
ply there cities do not stop running; do
not lose their profits. Every stream in
the land where there is head enough of
water to turn an undershOt wheel, every
fall where a few logs or stones can make
a dam, there you will find country mills
In fiat countries the old tuTn-abOut wind
mill, with its uneasy sails and its huge
rudder, is everywhere to be seen, and in
the south there are woodland mills that
are not even rooted over nor weather
boarded, where a dribble Of water turns
two diminutive bUTTs, set upon a plat
form made of slabs and punCheOns; all
the same, the mills run, and must run at
a profit. or the business would be discOn-
tinued, since there Is no capital invested
in them to enable them to sustain q loss.
80 it is, and 50 it will be, with the cotton
manufacture, for the reason that every
enterprise must have its rude beginning
in the rude way. and with the rude ap-
pliance. Capital, fine machinery, skilled
labor, organized system, and competition
ldNlllS CNOi y ClAClGJ ~ hCNp LAlN MAJ III
of profit from crossing over the border
and turning into loss; these do not come
until long afterward, and when the
highly artificial system has been per
fectly developed and matured. 1t Is
A LAW OF POLITICAL ECoNOMY
that in the fields where fine machinery,
steady labor and large capital are en-
plOyed, the margin both of profit and
wages is marked down to the lowest
point This was clearly and satisfaC-
tOrily demonstrated by General Francis
A. Walker in his able and instructive
introduction to the industrial statistics
of the ninth census. The points here
made are UncOnsciOUsly illustrated by
Mr.. Atkinson himself, when, referring to
| the mill reported upon by Mr.. Burke,
which contained six thousand nine hun
/ dred and fifty-five spindles operating
upon No. II yarn, he says: 1t would
/ not lie good economy to build a mill less
/ than four times the size" Would not
! be good economy where? ? They have
proved that it is good economy at the
! south to build these little thirty thou
sand dollar and forty thousand dollar
/ mills, never costing more than one hun
! dred thousand dollars or two hundred
! thousand dollars-proved it by their
/ amazing feCundity in dividends-pTOved
it by building more and more of them,
and by intending to build more of them
still. Last year, and year before last,
when the huge Fall river and Rhode
Island establishments, with their capitals
of from one million dollars up TO ten
million dollars, were idle, selling their
! goods below cost in New York, hands
starving and interest on debts crumbliDg
the value of all their stocks away,
THE LITTLE THREE-CENT ESTABLISH
| MENTs,
down south were busy as bees and merry
as Crickets, turning out their OsnabuTgs,
muslin and Jeans under full pressure, and
! reaping the rewards in dividends that
I ranged up from ten to thirty per cent
! At this very moment, when the esta bllsh-
! ments Of the SpTagues and BOyts and
| LaUrenCes are dying of dry-rOt, these
| nameless little yarn-weavers at the
south, in and around Augusta, and every
other riparian town, are not only coming
1 money, but educating the southern PeO-
pie IN the ways and means Of new IN
dustry which viii populate all their
/ waste places. Mr.. Atkinson says. The
| prevailing opinion IN the south that
| prosperity will of necessity ensue from
the establishment of numerous cotton
mills may not be well grounded, and II
NAV well be asked whether a section IN
which capital is scarce, and the rate O
interest, therefore, high, can afford in
vestments Of one hundred and fifty
thousand dollars in a business in which
only one bundled people would be en-
ployed, and not over thirty Thousand
dollars i year paid in wages" Pray, le
u ask Mr.. Atkinson, what Is the bcs
way to invest capital in and make inter
est low? How cid New England begil
with small mills. or with large ones