The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1878-01-12
Free Trade and the Sugar Gull
ture.
TO BE Continued
IN. o. Price Current.l


The South produces certain staples
which can be raised successfully in no
other section of the country, and
mainly depends upon foreign buyers
for the sale of these staples. The de-
mand from such buyers would be in
creased by a free interchange of com
modities. Hence for these reasons,
all the cotton States have advocated
free trade. Our own State produces
both cotton and sugar. AS cotton
State it fayors absolute free trade. As
a sugar State it advocates protection
by a revenue duty on the imports of
the foreign product. The bulk of the
United States consumption is fur
nished by the foreign product. But
with thorough drainage and efficient
levee system, we shall have sugar
lands enough to supply the entire de-
mand. This could not be accom-
plished without considerable Access
sion of capital and a corresponding
increase in population. If the culture
could be made SO profitable that it
could stand the reverses of occasional
crop failures, as in the present season,
the capital would be furnished and
the labor would come. In this event
the country would be nearly as indie
pendent of foreign sugars as it is now
of foreign corn. Political economists
and statesmen are not blind to these
facts, and, in considering the subject
from national point of view, North
ern men, who have no proclivities for
the South, viii be found to advocate
fair protection to the Louisiana pro-
duct.
But the question arises, why does
the Southern product require this pro-
tection7 The answer is, that the ac-
tual cost of production in Louisiana
is 50 much more than the cost in Gu
ba, that if the latter's product were
admitted free, under reciprocity
treaty, it wonld drive the former from
the market. The cost is predicated on
two elements the occasional severity
of the climate and the price of labor.
1t is hoped that the former can be OBJ
waited by the introduction of a Bra
lillian variety of cane, maturing in a
much shorter period than that which
we now cultivate. If this be so, in
nineteen seasons ont of twenty the
crop would be saved before freeze.
With regard to the latter, it de-
ponds upen the cost of subsistence.
The kilograms published on Thursday
apprise us that the laborers on the
Lachine canal in the Dominion, re-
ceive Zoe. an hour for wages, out of
which they have not only to furnish
substance to their families, but also
fuel, an essential aud expensive
charge, and the costly winter cloth
ing requisite in that cold climate, and
pay, moreover, rent for their dwell
ings. They are nevertheless able to
derive a satisfactory support from
their wages in consequence of the low
prices of all the necessaries of life,
especially of shoes, hats, apparel,
blankets and fuel, and all the pro-
duets of the field and the garden. If
Louisiana laborers could be furnished
with these neeessaries at the same
prices that are paid in Canada, they
could probably do as well as now,
even if under reduction of 50 per
cent. in wages. But they are COM
PEELED to pay much higher prices in
consequence of duties on the foreign
products which they consume, or of
correlative enhancement of the prices
of American products. Such being
the facts, it is evidently no more than
simple justice TO the Louisiana plant
er to protect him, to corresponding
extent, by duty on the foreign pro.
duct. II the entire expenses of Gov
eminent We're paid by direct taxes,
the Louisiana planter might stand
the change, as well as the Northern
manufacturers. But this is not ex-
pected even by the most advanced
advocates of free trade. Hence fair
and ludicious legislation requires a
thorough knowledge of ali the facts
underlying the question, and broad