The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1877-1885, 1878-05-16
CAPABILITIES.

1t is with no sectarian prejudices
that Southern Craftsmanship turns
attention to the consideration of the
material welfare of the South, or
strives to draw attention to It's capac-
ity for boundless development in all
the essentials of national wealth
and greatness. The influence of a
past era of political dogma, which
taught a theory of agricultural in
dependence, too proud for all al
lance with the ignoble pursuits OF
commerce and manufactures; and
which, confident in the control OF
the monopoly of it's great staples,
gave it over to the destinies OF
commerce, assigned to trade and the
mechanic arts a subordinate place;
and also, the extreme lengths to
which a strict construction Of the
constitution was pushed, repelling
instead of inviting, aid from the
general government for the prose
cution of works of internal i'm
provement, still fingers to an ex-
tent unwillingly admitted, yet
nevertheless sufficiently strong to
postpone a united effort SO imperi-
ously demanded by change of cir
cumstances.
The results of the war laid bare
the appalling contrasts resulting
from the opposite policy of the
North and South. The one de-
handing from the government aid
for national highways, harbor and
river improvements, bounties upon
her fisheries and protection for her
manufactures, and obtaining all
she asked, was enriched in all her
territory by the stream that flowed
in exhaustless profusion from the
nations Golfers; the other, reliant
upon the exuberant fertility of her
bountiful soil, stalking her existence
upon the variety and abundance of
her peculiar agricultural produc-
tons, proud of a wisdom and patri-
otism that construed the constitu-
ton as she conceived her fathers
had designed it, and therefore too
proud, too patriotic and too consci-
entious to ask OF accept any help
from the government, remains as it
came from the hands of nature ex-
cept as, marred by the rude hands
of ~servile labor. Peace, after four
years Of warfare, left n section
not only unscathed, but apparent
ly more prosperous than before;
because the fruits of national boun-
ty and nurture were developed un-
der the tests most fitted to prove
their value; and it found the other,
stripped of it's wealth, ruined in it's
labor system, in a condition in
which it was necessary to begin the
very foundation wall of a new exis-
tence. Cotton was no longer king;
rice had almost ceased to be a sta
pie; tobacco found itself face to
face with new rivals; sugar DEEPEN
dent upon large capital, and only
then maintained in existence by the
aid of protective tariffs, was left to
shift for itself; and it found it with
rivers unimproved, with harbors
choked up; and without manufac-
lures, and without that mechanical
instinct which had compelled to
use every waterfall in the Northern
States, filling the land with the
hum of industry and clothing the
waste places with the product of
human industry. Side by side the
sections lay, the one naturally in
ferior to the other in the elements
Of greatness and wealth, made rich
nv energy and diversified industry,
and helped onward by enormous aid
from the national treasure, sought
and demanded with no modes