The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1891-01-06
THE SOCIAL AND MORAL AS
Poets OF INDUSTRIAL
BOOMS.

was to temporarily reduce the NJ
of available markets for the worlds
products of industry. The blockade
of the Southern ports privateering on
the high seas and the extraordinary
consumption of products in the North
contrac ed the worlds trade with
America enormously. England's cot
ton inaustr es were for a time oro1ghf
to a stand still, and, as a consequence
her sales of cotton textiles in her for
eign Makes almost ~cease1.
This rapid and violent contraction
of American and English industrial
activity kept in suspense during the
Americ / n wal the commercial devil
op men; of both nations at home and
abroad. In the South in the mean
time the old system of slave labor had
beea destroyed. A new civilization,
with free labor as it's basis, took the
place of slavery; she was at least re
lieved of the industrial milestone about
her neck.
In spite of her depleted condition,
the South, but for the abortive effors
at political reconstruction, would have
been the least risky field available for
investment of capital. She had moth.
ing to lose and all to gain. Her ca
pacity for consumption was measured
by the thoroughness Of her destltu-
ton. Her soil had practically rested
for FIVE years and grown rich by natu,
raj recuperation. So that at the end
of the wal there was throughout all
the world for English and American
produces the huugriest market in the
history of these people.
The Federal Government rewarded
her discharged armies with public
lands beyond the Mississippi. With
that the tide of Western emigration
set in and the booming of the West
began. With the close of the wal
foreign immigration rose at an enor-
nous rate; in fact, many of the peas
antry of Europe only learned of the
American promised land through the
effect of the war upon Europe. These
generally settled in the West and the
North and added much to the con
sumptive capacity of those sections of
the restored Union.
All this multiplied markets for the
products of the South. What she lost
in Congress in the frontier and on the
battle field in the sixties, she had 10
stored to her in the seventies on the
field OF toll the balance of industrial
power. 1t is that very industrial pres
tige which largely determines the
course of legislation in Congress to-
day.
It is not free land that tempts men
to her States, it is free labor and wise
laws. But however free her labor or
wise her laws if the moral and social
aspects of her growth and power be
overlooked many of her ancient Writ
ues must rapidly disappear from her
people.
Booms are hot. bed develop nents.
By a sudden concentration of capital
the streams o: population are turned
to particular localities, away from
other fields of industry, on the strength
of pending and proposed improve
ments. Values of all kinds r.se and
speculation tempts men to the making
Of quick gains. All this is wei! enough
if no collapse follows the expansion of
values. Bu5 how can such a calamity
be STAYED off when every nine out of
ten men get the speculative fits and
lose their level heads?
Every boom must have two condi-
tons to prevent it from collapsing;
these are productive improvements
and population. In times of financial
panics when production hats the popu.
lation soon eats up the surplus. It is
by the failure of a boom whether by
slow shrinkage or quick, neuralgia
spasms that the moral integrity of in
dustrisl leaders is ut to the test and
the consequences of the mismanage-
ment of the productive agencies fall
upon all. 1t is of this-the relation of
boomers to the veal or woe of society
that l speak,
l. The men who lend their names,
character and credit to a boom, until
it has absorbed the savings of small
1nve 3tors, and then skulk out If it,
thereby letting the project fail or die,
are morally practising the basest of
swindles upon the community.
2. No Christian gentleman or hon,
orable S~ousherner should be so for
getful of his high sense of honor as to
become a party to such a scheme OF
roguery. The effect of it must be to
demoralize the better classes and de-.
base the personal integrity of long
trusted men.
3. The failure of a bonn in which
the small investors have taken stock
is the most damaging thing that could
happen, inasmuch as it destroys the
habit of say ng for want of confidence
in others to manage capital honestly
and nrnA..nA;--ol- MLa--:M Ll.-