The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1904-01-05
COTTON PLANTING.
Some Observations on Conditions-Bet-
ter Labor Needed.

TO the Editor of the Age-Herald:
Your editorial in Saturdays paper. De-
cember g. Cotton Prospects and Pos
sibilities," recalls the whole question CT
the possibility of other fields than the
south for raising cotton, so much dis
cussed of late. One receives the i'm
preston that vague dread is felt by
the American people lest the limit of pos
sibility may have been reached, or that
it may be found that somewhere cotton
can be grown in sufficient quantities at
least to jeopardize this great industry of
the south.
OF course, no one can say to what ex
tent the ravages of the boil wevil may
spread This is truly a cause for alarm
at present. but history and experience
tend to show that these insect pests have
their day and disappear not to return
again for a long time, and then always
in greatly decreased numbers or distruc-
tiveness. This. no doubt. is due to the
effectiveness of the defensive weapons
which mans ingenuity soon or later
is ready to bring to bear against them.
But the point to which it is desired
chiefly to direct attention is this appar
ent misapprehension of the possibilities
of cotton in the south. The capacity OF
the soil is wholly unlimited, and the
question is simply one of more cotton
growers. Every farmer in the south
knows there is not an acre in the cotton
belt but can be made to produce double
and treble the present ordinary yield.
Have we not seen it demonstrated time
and again when under the stimulus of
local prize offerings the yield of an acre
has been forced up to two and even four
and five bales?
/ doubt not that the possibility of some
such remarkable results has been demon
strated under competitive exertion for
prizes in every township of every county
where cotton is grown as the chief crop.
The failure in recent years to grow more
cotton is due to a stupidity and disinter-
estedness born of a feeling that there
is no money In cotton. The business has
never been crowded, even at the bottom
rounds of the ladder, a fact amply dis
closed by the observation that there has
always been cotton ground enough for
anywhere from fifteen to twenty acres to
the cropper and then, thousands of
acres left out. Clearly there can be no
money in five cent cotton that grows,
the bale to three or more acres, and gen.
orally speaking, the ground is not cult
waited for the most that can be made of
il. rather the least.
The negro is emnently satisfied (and
so are many of the shiftless whites)
Win a Sn11lc1ency TO his part to offset
the greedy advances of the merchant
This is the original idea about raising
cotton, and he is just as firmly set In il
today as at any time in all his past
The result is, therefore, that the ordi-
nary yield of these fifteen or more acres
is about what two acres can be brought
to do under the most slillful handling.
| heartily second you in the advocacy
of the immigration of Italian farmers.
The south today has room for as many
million thrifty German and Italian farm
ers and laborers as she already has of
negroes, thriftess and otherwise.
Our crying need is not for less cotton
but for more and better laborers, to re-
duce the per capita acreage. to reiuvi-
nate soil competent. though tired
through the starving process OF many
years of ceaseless drain upon it's 70
sources with no return. thus to make
one two, or more bales grow where now
a third Of bale or less is grown. There
is nothing idle or extravagant In the
proposition that the south can with
enough of the right kind of labor grow
forty million bales annually Just as east
ly as she does ten now
e. M. HARRIS. M D.
Village Farm. Franklin coutny. Ala.
December rs.