The Greenville times. [volume] (Greenville, Miss.) 1868-1917, 1889-05-18

tCol. J. n. q, Ptkin, read by II. II. Henry
The Sex, Mr.. Chairman, which by
usage you ascribe to the States-a dis
tinction warranted, too, by their beauty
Of proportion and material motive
would seem to denote boundless
capacity to talk for themselves; and,
indeed, from the original convention of
1887, down TO, and through the civil
war, they have not forborne in that
particular, nay, have been, at times
though we might suffer no man save
our Americans to venture the statement
about as lively set of termagants,
with bayonets for flnger-nails and the
cartridge box for a vocabulary, as
might be found on planet. flattened,
as are parties by turn at the polls.
Yet, they are magnificent lot Of erect,
combative and generous girls-and
you, Mr.. Chairman, despite your sim
ulated gravity, feel like myself spirit
ual extension Of arm adequate to span
all their waists at once, notwithstand-
ing the worry they give us at times,
when they exhibit less commendation
for our diligent service than solicitude
for our official fatigue, and retire us,
even against our protests Though we
may cling little more fervently each
to his 0wu State as an immediate
sweetheart, we glow with the exhilar-
alton that there are forty-one others In
the family, and yet more in the terri
torial cradles. Patriotism Is absolute
comfort under such benignant condi-
tions. II cannot be said, sir, that tho
States have usually gotten along to-
gether better than numerous daughters
Of a common household. The smaller
sisters found carly reason to complain
Of the larger, when there were but
thirteen In oil, and more recently GER
tain States, boisterous with the clatter
Of looms, have frowned upon and
berated state with no especial imple-
ment save cotton hoe, as a modern
Cinderella, subject to their demands.
But, as the furrow was Cincinnatus'
path to Roman power, so In the furrow
our Cinderella finds the road. and In
the pumpkin the chariot, to fulfil the
old fable, to attain industrial prince
dom, and to discover that the best |
heraldry is when drill, lever and spindle
stand In blazon beside the hoe, In frank |
declaration Of a consummate mastery,
not only over her acreage, and Of It's
products, but under Il and across the |
seas that wash II. Cinderella's sisters
moro imperious, largely because her
submission invited cxaction, just as we,
ct the South, plucked our staple for
New England, and left to New Eng
land the rich profit of It's conversion,
and the authority Of market. But
Cinderella-be her other name Mis-
sissippi, Alabama, Georgia or Louisi-
ana now stands with arms akimbo,
amid her prodigal resources, and will
soon dismiss that staple only as a
fabric, multiply her muscles by immi-
grafton and machinery, and, in other
words, not only milk her industrial
cow, but skim the cream, make the
butter and fix the market rate at homo.
She thought herself poor she finds her
self princess with an Eldorado of
wealth, and even now compels, in cap
ital and commerce, the obeisance of
her hitherto more prosperous North
ern sisters. Vast Pennsylvania of
metal and coal, lie under, and vaster
and unspent Wisconsins, of timber,
above, her sod. Her forests already |
groan In multudinous saw-mills, and
her awakened mines gasp In foundry
chimneys, and throb with ponderous
hammer beat. Our Cinderella de-
cllnes to be an agricultural drudge
longer for Lowell and Manchester, and
discovers that the very spine Of State
sovereignty Is industrial sovereignty.
A constitutional prescript alone, like
legend of "God Bless Our Home" on
the house-wall, does not necessarily |
achieve Its own morale, any more than
dormant coal, hundred feet beneath
q railway, propels locomotive on It.
Whatever fitly re-enforces the prescript
or legend, and makes It vital, is In our
selves. Upon the editors of the South,
Sir, especially devolves duty to sum
mon her activities to full measure of
diversified assertion, to the end that
she may muster great industrial alli-
ance for the plantation, reclaim her
idle manhood and acreage, and raise
villages and towns as well as crops.
The voice and extended arms Of her
broad Gulf welcome fleets of buyers of
every commodity from the wooden
clothes-pin to the most complex marvel
Of machinery all these exports wait in
our lavish raw material. May not the
insular knuckles, which Mississippi up
lifts In the Gulf waters, predict her
grasp upon such q commerce9 The
editor is historian, not only after but
before the fact; his cognent present.
ment Of what should ensue, often de-
termines the end. His pen is hurled
spear that transfxes the result; his
SNOWFALL, thrown high secures the
avalanche.
Nothing so addresses our patriotic
temper as the development of our
Sister States of the South, the future
Of which section depends not upon
n.