The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1899-08-25


market mnst be constant market
demanding year in and year out All
enormous supply Of staple food pro-
ducts. 1t must be local market,
because the things that make farm
ing profitable must be sold without
expensive transportation. Think of
a Georgia farmor with thirty. acre
field of cabbage or fifty acre field
of potatoes ready fnt tho market.
Can you imagine u moro helpless
mortal? Yet tho Northern farmer
finds no trouble in marketing a like
quantity of cabbage or potatoes. He
may not get Il satisfactory price for
them, neither does tho Southern
farmer get a satisfactory price for
his cotton, but there is always mar
ket for it, and Il market price rs we'll.
In the same way there is always u
market and market price in the
Northern States for all products of a
farm, whereas the Southern farmer
would find it almost impossible to
dispose of his cabbages and potatoes
at any price. He would become dis
gusted in tho effort, and tho products
would probably rot where they had
grown.
Now we como to tho all importan,
question: Why IS it that there is
practically an unlimited market in
the Northern States for the diversified
products of agriculture? Tho ques-
ton is easily answered. There OK.
lists in that section great industrial
army that must DO fed. Nearly ono
third of the population Of the north
ern and central Western States draws
its support from the shops and fac.
tories that are scattered throughout
the territory. No wonder there is
market foT@ food products. Abolish
the factories and workshops of the
| North and the farmers of that sec
ton would have to fall back upon
one or two staple products that
would stand long transportation.
They would have to be governed by
the same natural laws that control
Southern agricultural interests today,
and the outcome would be identical
with ours.
The sum of it all is this Southern
farming will never prosper until we
have diversified agriculture; diver
sified agriculture will be impossible
until we have a diversified market,
and diversified market can come
onl y when we manufacture here in
the South the raw products of our
soil, our mines and our forests.
We dig the ore from our mines,
make it into pig iron, and ship it
away. We raze our forests to the
ground, and ship tho timber away.
We exhaust our splendid es to
produce cotton, and this, too, is
shipped away. These great staple
products all leave the South as raw
materials. Our iron, our timber and
our cotton go to northern and
European factories. We delve for the
treasure and deliver it to others with
out ransom or reasonable profit.
Did you ever stop to consider what
the South loses through her failure
to manufacture her raw materials at
homo? The estimate is easily made.
We know what it costs to convert a
ton of pig iron into merchantablo
products. We know what it costs TO
convert n thousand feet of lumber
into furniture and other commodities.
We know what it costs to manufac-
ture a bale Of cotton into cloth, and
we know, too the amount Of labor
necessary for these several operations
and the wages that would bo earned
by the mon engaged in the work.
SO the calculation is simple one.
Here are the figures, and | confess
to you that they astonish mo when !
added up the totals:
Including only the throo items of
cotton, pig iron and lumber, the
annual product of the southern
States has market value of $780,
! 100000. OF this, Southern factories
aud shops utilize an annual valua-
ton of $G0,000,000. OF these three
articles of raw material there is
| shiDDed ont Of tho Soutb oyorv ,oo.