The Lafayette gazette. [volume] (Lafayette, La.) 1893-1921, 1894-12-29
THE SOUTHERN COTTON
Mills CROWDLWG OUT THE
NE " ENGLAND Mills.

New Orleans Picayune.
The dry goods men of New York
are making great hue and cry
over the fact that the railroad COM
panies have raised the commoner
qualities of cotton goods from
third to second-class and have in
creased the freight rates in accor-
dance with the new classification.
The dry goods jobbers Of the Me-
tropolis claim that as the South now
manufactures the medium and com
mon classes of cotton goods more
cheaplv than the Eastern mills, the
latter are only enabled to com {
through the discrimination in freight
charges in favor of the Eastern
points as against the Southern.
The New York Journal of Com
merce and Commercial Bulletin
puts this very plainly in a recent
article. That journal says:
1t should require no argument to
convince the railway companies
that they are as deeply interested as
the manufacturers and jobbers of
dry goods in maintaining the pre-
eminence of New York as dis,iib
uting center. 1t appears to the dry
goods trade that in their new CLASH
fcation of cottOns the railway man
ayers have overlooked this fact.
Reducing the finest cottons from
first to second class has little or no
effect upon the distributing business
at this point, because those articles
must be obtained from New York
and points east of it. But advance
ing nearly all the cheaper and heav-
Ter cottons from third class to sec
ond class is likely to affect the East
crn manufacturers and jobbers Sc
siously, for it is in these lines that
the South is developing large man
ufacturing business. TO advance
the classification Of cottons of these
grades between New York and Chi
cago is to turn the scale just SO
much against the mills and jobbers
of the East and in favor of South
ern production. The railroad man.
ayers reply that even after they
have advanced the classification Of
cottons to the second class the rates
from this city to the West will be
below those from Southern points.
This may be true, but it is evident
that the dry goods trade is not con-
WINGED of it, and even if it were
true the advance of 80 per cent in
freight charges on the Commoner
classes of cottons, unbleached sheet
ing excepted, would make a marked
difference in the terms on which the
East and South enter the Western
markets. Railroads from this point
can do themselves no good by driv-
ing any trade toward the South.
This is an important acknowl-
edgem ent on the part of an influen-
tial New York publication of the
rapidly growing importance of the
South as center of cotton manu-
featuring. The New England mill
owners fully realize this fact, and
some Of them have already taken
steps to establish branch plants in
the South for the manufacture of
the medium and conmoncr kinds of
cotton goods. They perceive not
, only that they will be enabled to
compete better tor domestic trad
from plants in the South, but that
they will also be better able to re-
tain their foreign trade, which is
necessarily worked on much closer
margins than the domestic trade.
That the South, which produces
the raw material, is also the logical
center of cotton manufacturing is
now being generally recognized.
hence the growth of cotton mills in
the South will keep on steadily un-
til the section becomes the greatest
center of cotton manufacture in the
world.
CHRISTMAS