The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-03-04
THE NEW SOUTH.
Progress I'm the Southern states
since the Civil War.


The advances which have been made in
the Southern States in the third Of a
century since the close OF the war OF Sc
cession have been one Of the marvels OF a
marvellous age. When John Jay was nego-
tiating the treaty with England IN 1874.
which bore his name. he appears not 10
have been aware that cotton had chance
TO ever become an important article OF ex-
port from the United States. The inven.
ton OF Eli Whitney's cotton gin about the
same time. but which had not yet got into
operation, and by which one man could.
in the preparation of cotton for the market
do the work previously done by a bundled
men. made swift and sweeping change IN
the conditions. anu ultimately converted
the South into the field for the production
of cotton for the world
When John c. Calhoun, in his speech on
the compromise measures of 1s50-tke
speech which he composed but which he.
not having the strength to deliver 1t. gave
to Mason, of Virginia, to read to the Ser
ate-uttered his lamentation at the calami-
tous fate Of the South. which was. as he
thought. condemned to be forever the
newer Of wood and drawer OF water for
the North. he voiced view which was en-
tertained by almost everybody at that
time. in the North as wen as In the South
But the on-coming years have brought a
change which nobody could have foreseen
then. The abolition of slavery, which the
South frantically fought in Congress and
on the battlefield. opened that section to
the capital and enterprise OF the world
replaced the slave labor. which was in
reality ruinously dear, with the paid and
intelligent freemen. The South's magnif-
cent natural resources have been deveI-
oped. and by the Midas-touch of the new
forces which have gone into that region
the South's hills and valleys have been
turned into gold.
The United States has, in the past two
CT three years, gone far ahead Of Great
Britain. which had led the world hithe.--
to, in iron production. and the South. es-
pecially the States of Georgia. Alabama
and Tennessee, has contributed large
part of the country's gain in this depart
ment of activity. AS cotton factories have
sprung up beside the cotton fields, SO fur
naces and mills have been erected at
the mouths OF the mines all over the
South, and the mines of that section are
among the Richest and most extensive in
the United States. 1t is estimated that
the deposits of iron ore in the three
Southern States named are great enough
to supply the entire world for a century
or two if all the mines elsewhere were
TO close. Here is source CT wealth to
the South which was never dreamed OF
by It's statesmen and publicists of forty
years ago, and whose development would
have been impossible under the slavery
regime
We were mistaken" exclaimed the
Southern statistician and abolitionist-
hater. De Bow, after the war had over
thrown the South's peculiar institution,
Slave labor was more ruinous to the
South than it was humiliating to the slave.
God has given the South a glorious her.
itage in natural resources. Let us set
to work 10 utilize them. We want legis-
lation in each State to encourage immf-
grafton and the investment of capital
Then the hum Of industry Will be heard
from the Potomac to the Rio Grande. ard
the South will be prosperous and glori-
mis- -