Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1897-11-10
MR.. RODDEY'S PLAN.


ENQUIRER will be found an earnest, in
teresting and sensible communication
from Mr.. John T. Roddey on the COT
ton question.
Coming as it does Immediately upon
the heels of the suggestion to make an
other effort in the direction of organiza-
ton of the cotton growers of the south,
we can only take it as indicative Of the
fact that Mr.. Roddey is still heart and
soul in the movement, and will give it all
the aid that lies in his power.
THE ENQUIRER has more than once
endorsed the Roddey idea as a good one;
but all our endorsements have been made
with full appreciation of the tremen-
dous magnitude and seeming impossl-
bility of the task. Our views have not
changed in the least. We still look upon
the plan as practicable, and continue to
realize that it cannot, and will not, be
carried out, except by dint of great
deal of earnest, intelligent, well-directed
and unselfish effort on the part of mon OF
patriotism and capacity, who must be
backed by the hearty cooperation of all,
or practically all of the cotton producers
of the south.
There are still those. no doubt, who
would hold the Roddey plan as imprac-
ticable- -chimerical; but, at the same
time, it is fact that it has important and
significant recommendations now that it
did not have three years ago when Mr..
Roddey first gave it to the public. 1twas
in November, 1894, that the plan was first
suggested. At that time January futures
were selling in New York as low as 5.2S,
and spot cotton was selling on the York
Vile market at from Al to 5.
Mr.. Roddey, it will be remembered,
came to Yorkville in December, 1894, and
assisted in the organization of the York
county farmers along the line of his pre-
vious suggestions, and Governor Evans
was requested to call convention of the
cotton growers of the state to be held in
Columbia for the purpose of promoting
the organization still further. The object
of the convention was practically the
same as that called by President Will
born, of the state Alliance, to meet in CO.
lumbia this week. But for some reason,
Governor Evans failed to appreciate the
Importance of the undertaking, and a
movement, which might otherwise have
proved most significant one, died in its
incipiency.
The force of the Roddey plan was not
entirely lost, however. Working along
the lines of his suggestion, prominent
men in the other cotton growing states
took up the idea and held numerous meet
ings. All the prominent newspapers of the
south, with but few exceptions, discussed
the matter seriously, and pretty soon re-
suits began to show themselves in steady
but sure advance in the price of cotton.
Of course there are those who will assign
other reasons; but review of the record
of 1894 will show steady decline in the
price of cotton up almost to the very week
of the appearance of Mr.. Roddey's first
letter, and from then on straight through
until the following October, there was
steady rise. The range of prices between
November, 1894, and October, 1895, was
from 5.2S to 9.35, and it is we'll remember
ed fact on the day after one OF Hector d.
Lanes conventions, which though sug-
gested by the Roddey plan, were not
nearly so practical in their purpose,
futures rose from 10 to Is points at a jump.
Now, as we have already said, we be-
lieve in this thing but while we believe
in it, we recognize that in order to be sue
cessful, it must cover all Of the cotton
producing states. York county alone, or
even South Carolina, can accomplish
nothing, except to help set the ball in
motion; but if York county will enter
into the matter again as heartily as in
1894, and South Carolina will enter into
it as heartily as York county, then it will
be an easy matter to spread the leaven
through the balance Of the COTTON grow
ing states, and the distant future will
realize in the farmers of the south an in
dependent financial power compared with
which the Alliance was not circum-
stance, and the like of which this, nor no
other country has ever seen.