The herald and news. [volume] (Newberry S.C.) 1903-1937, 1905-01-10

evitably result in textile trade stimu-
lation. But the farmers do not need
to be forced to take or 7 cents for
their raw cotton to stimulate the
manufactured products market. Ten
cents would produce as favorable an
effect, and the SINNERS would not
hesitate to pay 1t now if the con-
fdence men who stand between them
and the farmers, to the demoraliza-
ton Of the cotton market could be
chased off the field:
Let the cotton farmers of the south
stand together and hold fast for
better prices according to their pres
ent plan of solidarity to that end.
They were never better able 6nan-
cially to hold their cotton than now.
The cotton will keep.
1t is safe to say that no record
crop will be produced in the south
next season. The cotton grower
has a score to pay off with the spec
ulative bears, and he will pay it next
fall. Production will be curtailed.
Concerted action has reduced the
cotton acreage in years past, and it
will reduce it next spring. The
held-over bales will sell ior a fair
profit when the new crop is put on
the market, if not sooner. No cot
ton farmer should sacrifice his hold
ings at present prices who is not
forced by the extremity of his Pc
cuninary necessities to seek the mar
ket, and for all such there should be
relief in an iron-clad holding BROTH
erhood. 1t is to the interest Of cot
ton holders to see that distress cot
tom is kept off the market, and it
should be part of the union plan to
stand behind the weak ones financial
ly.
The cooperation should not be
confined to the farmers. 1t is the
duty OF every public-spirited citizen
in the cotton belt-of every man who
knows that his self-interest in gen.
eral southern prosperity-to lend the
cotton holding movement his moral
and business support. Especially is
this true to our bankers and mer-
chants. We must all stand or tail
with the farmers.
If this is donev- the unsold por-
ton of this years crop held and a
decreased acreage planted next
spring-there will be no repetition
in future of the great bear raid of
1904. Cotton values will become
remunerative and stable, as they
should be.
Meanwhile, let US hope that the
statistical system of the government
will be perfected, or at least modi-
fed on a strictly statistical basis,
with no more forecasting guesswork,
and no more approximation in lieu
Of absent statistics. Let the GIN
ners go ahead with their organization
which proposes to cooperate with
the census bureau by furnishing it
exact. sworn statistics of gin re-
ceipts. If the government must ac-
Quaint the world with the condition
and volume of the cotton farmers
crop, the only protection to the far
mer in the system lies in the accur-
acy and frequency of report. This
must be had, at any expense, it the
plan of official bulletins is to per-
form its true function The cotton
growers are not attacking the prin-
ciple Of government reports; they
are criticising present methods.
An overhauling of the bulletin sys-
tenn and its experimentation by ex-
tending the statistics to the actual
consumption of the raw staple each
year, the expectation figures, and the
surplus held over, as proposed in the
amendment to be offered by Con-
gresham Burleson, of Texas, will
go far to change cotton market con-
ditions in the future in favor of the
producer, who asks only that the law
of supply and demand be observed