The Pickens sentinel. [volume] (Pickens, S.C.) 1871-1903, 1886-08-26
government; nor it's losses charged to
maladministration.
THE REMEDY
THE REMEDY.


governments; nor it's losses charged t
maladministration
THE REMEDY.
Without ignoring, or L think undol
rating, the effect of financial Legislation
either Federal or State, upon our agri
culture, am of those who find that tn
chief cause Of its present depression i
the faulty system upon which it is di
rcctcd. OF this system it has been sal,
that it looks to sending abroad every
thing that we produce, and bringinl
back everything that VIC consume Tha
with 1t homo commerce is nothing; ex
ports and imports everything. Tha,
whenever our capital finds investment
outside the farm, it is in railroads made
necessary by this system, and whose OBJ
vious interest, lying in securing tho
longest haul of the largest freight, is tc
intensity it. And finally that under il
the producer is given over to the rule OF
that class OF business people who arc
occupied merely with the distribution OF
the products of labor, adding value to
them only by change of place, and that
the merchant and the transporter have it
all thclr own way i'll apportioning the
avalls. Ihis may be too trenchant crit
clsm, but we are compelled to admit that
there has been much force III it in the
past; that there is too much force in it
now; and until it substantially ceases to
apply to our methods, can see no abid-
ing prosperity for us. We are too ex-
! clusivcly devoted to agriculture, and orr
agriculture is confined to too limited n
range of production. The standing in
junction of the agricultural Journals
''Keep the boys on the farm" is based
upon fallacy. 1t should be, "Send n
full proportion of them from the farm. 3"
Put them to developing the resources of
our forests and mines; send them to the
trades and occupations which will supply
at home what we buy from abroad.
BWld up manufactures of any and
everything for which there is demand.
Invite capital to embark upon these in
dustncs by favoring legislation. Thus
increase the class of profitable consum-
crs, and make for the farmer that home
market, which is for him the best of all
markets, and without which he cannot
diversity to its most profitable extent the
products of his farm. The markets
abroad, the farmer finds the circle of
competition widening as he goes, and he
is handicapped with frcights to an extent
that confines his shipme nts to special
and not always his most profitable crops.
With us the list for expectation embraces
for the larger part of the State but a
single item, cotton. Rice takes the place
OF cotton III small section, and there is
some talk Of introducing tobacco as an
additional so-called money crop. But
what We want are the consumers to take.
and the crops to be sold, in the home
market. Fresh meats, the products of
the dairy, fruits, vegetables, live stock
are transported with difficulty and at
an expense which limits the distance to
which they can be sent, yet it is in the
production of the most pcrishablc of
these that the farmer finds the most rc-
mncrativc results Of his labor and the
largest increase in the value of his land.
An acre devoted to market gardening,
near city, will rent annually for what
will buy the fec simple to five acres de-
voted III this State to cotton; and when
live stock is the object (the least profta-
bic of the products enumerated, because
the least perishablc and the easiest trans
ported to distant markcts) q Kentucky
bluegrass farm will rent or sell for three
times rs much per acre as cotton plan
tation.
Without going further into these gen
cl1l considerations it docs seem to me
that the progress we have made since the
devastation Of the late war has been, not
because OF. but despite the system upon
which we have worked; that the dcpres-
sion we arc labOrlng under is the lcgiti-
mate consequence of that system; and
that as long as we adhere to it We will
continue to have our periods of claton
and Tree expenditure when the price of
our single money crop, from causes
which we do not control, is up; and our
| periods Of dependency over cramped
resources, when it is down. We cannot,
1t IS true, escape the vicissitudcs of sea-
sons, nor cVadc the primal curse; but We
must no longer look so exclusively to
foreign markets, nor i'll any any market
suspend our fate upon q single hair. We
must, by divcrsifying the pursuits of
our people, enlarge the home market,
that alone fully rcpays the farmers
labor, and III ordering that upon the
farm we must recognize the law of
chances, which is as rigid as any other
imposed upon nature. Like the insur-
ancc mon, VIC must spread our ventures
over broad surface to hope to realize q
reasonably certain profit
AGRICULTURAL cAPABILITY OF THE STATE.
circumstances sometimes forbid n
mixed husbandry and compel adherence
to the one crop system, but in no section
OF this State do such limitations exist
In the coast region, beside the valuable
crops OF rice and sea island cotton, easy
access to large centres of population
make market gardening moro or less
practicable on every farm, and the
natural perennial pastlwago of cheap,
unimproycd highlands and swamp, com
bincd with climate requiring no winter
shelter for stock, gives opportunities un-
surpassed even on the Western plains
for the addition Of pastoral farming In
the middle section of the State, between
tidcwatcr and the falls of thcNrivcrs, and
in that part Of it which more especially
constitutes the cotton belt, on almost
any one plantation may be grown each
! Southern staple that is planted, and all
Of the cereals. The soil seems specially
adapted to root crops; garden vcgcta-
blcs and fruits do well. The soil, q
sandy Loan, IL not 50 well adapted to
/ the l1Su0lly cultivated nraSSCS but Yalua-