The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1901-05-28

Then reckoning the population OF
the South at 20, OOO, 900, let us esti-
mate that of these IL, OOO, 900 are
white people, and it becomes plain
that we can readily spare 1000, 900
white people for operatives in fac.
tories to turn Scent cotton into 49,
cent cotton cloth. If we export this
product we receive from abroad
5000, 900, 900 instead of $500, 900, OOOfor
raw cotton alone. This is without
increase of population and is without
additional outlay over and above
what we now outlay. 1t means a
profit of twice the present gross
value Of the cotton crop. 1t means
people who have had 500 to spend
will have $500 to spend it means
looking after our material interest
and having material prosperity, 1T
means 81, OOO,O 600, 900 for the next
cotton crop, which has heretofore
brought $500, OOO, 900. 1t means good
houses for our factory people to live
in, good schools, good churches, bet,
ter institutions, lower taxes, better
railroads and better country roads
to travel on and the comforts snd
necessaries of life.
We now realize that the more fac
tories and mills and railroads we
have in a community, the better j.
the general business activity of thu
section, and the more prosperous Is
the farmers. So it behooves US to
continue to diversity our industries
and still cling to the system that en-.
courages a free interdependence of
our citizens one upon another. We
of the South ROW have only to APP
preciate the necessities of a people
being able to live at home. We had
depended upon foreign nations for
supplies; the North, upon herself.
The one section had stood by a tariff
for protection the other had not.
When the planters slaves increased
in the South and when his granaries
were filed, his next door neighbOr
was not so prosperous but when the
factory was built up in the Northern
and Southern towns, values increased
in all the neighbOrhoOd, employment
given to all, and money put into
empty pockets. The staying quail
ties of the North's prosperity we're
much better than ours.
1t does really seem odd to me how
any SOutheTner who passed through
the deprivation of the Civil War
could really doubt the advantages of
protection. It is strange TO say hat
he has not discerned that the free
trade idea in the South is the only
surviving partner for the institutions
of slavery and in our business affairs
home truth, like home manufacture,
has ever met an unwelcOme recep-
tom. For more than a quarter of a
century the protective tariff system
has been the hitching-post of our
prejudice, and on this subject reason
always knocks in vain at the door of
our understanding. Cotton, sugar,
rice and certain fruits are produced
in the South only. Special advan-
tages given to climate and soil n
ables cotton to take are of itself it
needs no protection because we can
make more of it than the country
needs. With lumber, wool, iron ore,
bessemer steel, coal and sugar, it is
quite different. Nine tenths of the
sugar produced abroad is consumed
in the United States. Halt clad,
half starved labor produce it. I'M
port duties on foreign sugars used to
make up all the tariff revenues in
the United States. Nothing pro
duced by the powerful and rich
North yields such a protection. All
that it produces and manufactures
is hedged by a tariff tax that prevent
large importation. Our sugar-prO-
ducing area is certainly as valuable
for furnishing the people of this
country with sugar and mOlasses as
is New England, producing no cotton
or wool, in furnishing them with
cotton and wooden goods. Alabama,
Tennessee, Virginia, and West Vir-
GINA are making iron and steel as
readily as Pennsylvania. Georgia
and the Carolinas can we'll manufac-
ture cotton and WOODEN goods to the
same extent as Massachusetts and
Rhode Island. Texas, with her
annl-n nnnn O 4hnrsand hills and