New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1882-10-01
A NEW FASHION IN TIE SOUTH.


One of the most encouraging bits of evidence
laid before the Tariff Commission has been
given by Southern manufacturer. Mr..
Blankenship is president of the Chamber of
Commerce in Richmond and one of the most
successful and enterprising manufacturers In
the Old Dominion. He attributes the indu strlal
prosperity of that city and State since the war
to the tariff, and aflirms that the mass of the
people i'll the most thrifty and enterprisng sec
tons are prOtectiOnists. He asserts that public
sentiment i'll Richmond is so overwhelmingly
protectODist that whenever there is Congress
sona election every candidate, whether Re-
publican. Readiuster or Democrat, ,endeavors
to prove that he is the highest tariff man i'll the
field The free-traders, he adds, are either
importers or college professors or dOctrnalres,
while successful merchants and practical
business men are ranged on the other side.
These assertions are very significant when
the fact is borne in mind that Richmond has
steadily advanced i'll prosperity since the
war, having made greater progress in pOpula-
ton, wealth, volume of business and material
resources than any other city along the Southern
seaboard 1t is decided gain for the tariff cause
that one of the most conservative and enter
pllSnp CllleS III tilb DOulH SuOulu HdNC DcCpuo
protectionist stronghold.
But this is not the only encouraging feature
of Mr.. Blankenship's testimony. He says that
there is new spirit in the Old Dominion.
The fact is now recognized that work is honor
able and lack of work dishonerable. He does
not know any young man who is ashamed to
work Richmond has become a city where
work is the fashion and where man who does
not work is despised In 1865 the city was in
ruins, business was Frustrated, everybody was
poor 1t has been rebuilt and is to-day a
tlourishing centre of Southern industry and
enterprise. The population are proud of their
success and ascribe it to their own working
capacity. If they have outstripped other
Southern cities, it is because they have become
working people, and it is this fact which
renders the future of Virginia brighter than
it could have been under the old system when
labor was questionable and carried with it So
cial disgrace. We have no doubt that Mr.. Blan-
kenship has touched one of the secret springs of
Virginian prosperity in these new days. The
hands and brains of the new Nirginians are
busy. Social antecedents and ancestral pride
have lost their influence. Self-respecting
labor is IL badge of distinction which tho sons
of the First Families of Virginia do not 0isdain
to wear. They are Taught to earn their own
living in cOuntng-rOom or factory as matter
Of course, because work is honorable and
loafing or dawdling degrading, and not because
the sons of English noblemen are occasionally
placed III com mercal houses. The social
atmosphere promotes business activity in every
craft, profession and station.
This is most hopeful sign, which does not
fail to impress every Northern visitor Mobile,
Savannah, Charleston and Wilmington have
retained the Characteristic features of Southern
life and habi s. In Richmond there is q hustle
in the streets, systematic and orderly course
of business, and general sense of activity,
briskness and bu0yancy, which one does not
see in other Southern cities. Nor are the signs
of thrift and accumulated capital wanting.
In the business quarter there are substantial
warehouses and manufactures, and in the
shaded streets there are scores OF handsome
residences built by the new generation OF
Virginians since work has come into fashion.
1t is a dull visitor who does not discern in
Richmond many traits OF the workaday North.
The city is rapidly acquiring the aspects and
manners of a Northern town. 1t has learned
TO value labor as honorable and reputable as
well as remunerative 1t is following the best
fashion of tOilsOme century-the fashion OF
xyorl