The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1898-10-19
The Cropping Evil.
Memphis Commercial Appeal

All efforts so far by conventions to
curtail the acreage or cotton have failed.
It seems to me that there is ID way to
success, and it is by putting an end to
.ae prevailing system of cropping. An
owner of land usually rents out his
tracts as they individually seem capa-
BILE of cultivating. These tenants pro-
ceed to put in as much cotton as they
individually can possibly cultivate and
twice as much as thoy can possibly
| pick out; then, Mt harvest, extra pick
ers arc in demand, and they being
| scarce, are able to dictate their own
terms, the consequence being that the
cotton costs more than it will bring in
the market. Resolutions by cOnven-
tiOns cannot alter this condition. Plant
crs meet and resolve to plant less cot
ton, go home, rent out their lands to
crOppers and the old game is played
over, year after year.
Is there no remcdy7 think there is.
Let landlords hire labor and pay for it
rs it is performed. The merchants arc
to blame that this plan has not been
adopted long since. If q land owner,
seeing tho evil of cropping years ago.
approached merchant land cotton
factory and asked for assistance to
work his lands, in the form of cash ad-
vance. agreeing to give mortgages on
his lands, crops, stock, etc, the mer-
chant would cOldly refuse; he would be
willing to aid with merchandise, for
which he would charge rs large AZ profit
perhaps q little cash now and then to
pay doctors bills and for collins. The
planter was compelled to accept these
terms and went sOrrOwfully home and
again let out his land to small tenants,
who consented to work after II fashion,
provided they were furnished with
supplies i'll quantities largely beyond
the actual value Of their labor.
There is large number of planters
with credit SO we'll established that
they can get the cash needed and can
work their lands with hired labor. They
can put in rs much or as little cotton
as tn--. link it profitable to raise, and
there can Do complaint among the
laborers if they aia paid i'll full every
Saturday night.
Planters too often buy their corn iil-
stead of making it. They say it is not
o paying crop, and it is not, when made
to the acre as cotton, but it requires
ten months to cultivate and harvest q
crop of cotton, and but five months for
corn, and at less than half the expense
of labor.
Merchants and factors who hold large
plantations, on which they have fore
closed, may not fancy the plan suggest
cd, as these plantations are dumping
grounds for large quantities of incr-
chandise, but it will pay, even them, to
have responsible managers and pay
their laborers weekly; nor will it in any
way affect their merchandise business,
as each OF these owners maintains Il
store on his plantation, where, instead
of supplying his people on credit. he
can sell them goods for cash.
AS long as the owners of large bodies
Of land leave their land to the ignorant
management of irresponsible croppers,
white and and black, just so long will
wages of labor in this favored South
ern land will be on purity with those
of the peasantry of Germany, Italy or
Russia. JAMES B. CRIGHEAD.,
Arkansas.