Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1882-07-14
Agricultural.
The Ph@nl1 TO che VVatchman.
WHY DOES VERMONT LOSE ALL THE NATURAL
INCREASE OF POPULATION.

WHY DOES VERMONT LOSE ALL THE NATURAL
INCREASE OF POPULATION
We copy an article on this subject from the
Brattleboro PHOENIX. There is sense in the
article, but it docs not go to the bottom OF
the matter by many fathom. II is true that
many Vermont farmers have emigrated, and
continue to emigrate, but it is not because
they dislike Vermont, or have poor opinion
of Vermont soil. The great majority Of our
exiles are men who have run in debt for
farms and have found it impossible to pay
for them. They struggle along until they
see that IL they struggle longer they will have
nothing left Then they sell out, realizing
what they can, and leave Vermont for the
cheap lands of Kansas, Iowa or Dakota. They
don't go because they want to- but because
they must. When young farmers with little
or no money arc willing to work out until
they have the money to buy q farm and pay
for it, Vermont agriculture will be on a new
basis, and emigration will cease. - Wdtchnldn.
As 10 the bottom of the matter, which ac-
cording to the Waterman appears to be down
several fathoms, we had no intention of pre-
cipitating ourselves to such dangerous depth,
but so far as there was liability to accident
from this cause, judging only from the above
comment, we think the agricultural editor of
| the Watohman equally safe. 1.-THE great ma
jority of our exies, he says, ''are men who
have run in debt for farms and found il i'm
possible TO pay for them" Not so in this
part of the state nor in any part ofitto which
our acquaintance extends. The instances
within our knowledge where people have en-
igrated from Vermont because they had
bought farms which they were unable to pay
for, are extremely rare.
| Among the hundreds whom we have known
as natives of Vermont who are now living in
| other states, we do not now recall one who
may fairly be presumed to have been induced
to emigrate from this cause, while we can
name many enterprising, forehanded farmers
who sold out and emigrated from the state to
invest their capital where it would be aug
mented by the rapid advance in value of prop
erty in the west. But neither this class nor
those who are forced to the cheap lands of the
west constitute the greater part of the emf
grants from Vermont, though the loss to the
state from capital taken out of it by cmigrants
and sent out of it by residents is very consid.
cradle.
The chief drain upon the state-that which
has contributed by far the largest share 10 the
100000 natives of the state not residents of il
is the emigration Of young people, often
before they become settled in life and not @
few of these leave with exaggerated ideas Of
the advantages of some distant locality, who
might have remained had they justly appre
cated their own state. How many of those
who have left Vermont to seek homes in the
west have been aware that the average prod
uct per acre of all the principal farm crops il
greater here than there, and that the averag,
condition of the farmers here, measured b,
the value of their possessions, is better thai
that of the farmers of the west?
The newspapers OF this state and those o
other states circulating here, have done mucl
to encourage emigration by publishing highl,
colored statements, often made by intereste
parties, of the productiveness of the land AM
the general desirability as place of residenc
of localities in the west and while, as state
in our article above referred to, western pa
pers are filed with praises each Of its ow
locality, we seldom see in a Vermont pape
anything designed to encourage immigration
to the state, or even to discourage our youn
men from leaving it. There may be othe
states just as good as Vermont but there ar
few that arc better. More of the native Dol
ulation should stay at home and help develo
its resources. We have trustworthy statistic
which tend to prove that, ON an average, star
ing equal, those who remain are as well eli
cumstanced as those who have gone.