Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1907-04-10
ORGANIZING COTTON GROWERS.
E. D. SMITH RETURNS FROM GEORGIA
AND ALABAMA.

~ ooltohS VI III SoOSOh SIoWCIS
Association, was in the city to-day.
He has just returned from Georgia
and upper Carolina and reports that
the work of organization is getting
along very finely, and that he and all
the officers of the Association are
very much encouraged.
Mr.. Smith says that the farmers
are now realizing the force and USE
fulness of business organization.
To-day he gave out the following
interview with regard to the present
work in hand:
"Since the Birmingham Conven-
ton / have been busily engaged in
organizing the work of the Southern
Cotton Association. l have just
completed a tour through Alabama
and Georgia. The work has been
the most successful of any yet accom-
plished committees have been ap-
pointed to solicit subscriptions to or
ganize warehouse and holding COM
panies for the purpose of locally
financing the cotton crop and main
tanning a profitable price to the
grower. At every place visited the
plan adopted by the Birmingham
Convention for organizing companies,
for building warehouses, negotiating
loans and concentrating the cotton in
the hands of a business committee
has met with uniform approval.
cit is manifest to every business
nan that cotton is the basis of our
credit and is wholly our circulating
medium. It is absurd to expect the
negro, and the poor and dependent
white producer to be able to main
tain the proper value for this article,
upon which every interest in the
South is dependent, when those who
buy it from them, up to now, have
fixed the price, represented the or
gained brain and capital of the
world, and whose business it is to get
the article as cheeply as possible.
The North, British, America and
Europe consume about IS per CEN
of u cotton crop. Hence IS per
cent of our buyers represent foreign
capital. Now, is it not an absurd
proposition to leave to the poor debt
ridden, disorganized producer of COT
ton to go up against the representa-
tive of Northern, Canadian and Eu-
ropean capitalists, with unlimited re-
sources, perfect organization and ex.
pect them, the poor disorganized, to
win and bring into the South, in con-
fict with the worlds richest and
shrewdest, anything like the full
value OF the cotton crop, upon which
we all are dependent? There is not
q bank, mercantile establishment or
any business vocation or %avocation
in the South that is not dependent
directly on the currency brought into
circulation by the sale of the cotton
crop.
"Now, it is manifestly the height
of folley-from a business standpoint
to leave to the poor and disorgan.
lied producer to determine in a con-
fict with the shrewdest foreign buyer
the amount of money that shall be
put into circulation in the South, to
determine the deposits in our banks,
the amount of goods to be sold by
our merchants, the comforts and con-
veniences Of our homes, the educa-
ton OF the boys and girls of the
South, and the development of our
Teso rrces, the establishment of our
manufacturing plants, to manufacture
the raw material in the South by the
capital of the South, 80 as to obtain
not only the profit on the raw mate
rial, but the greater profit on the fin
ished article, to develop our water
power, so as to light our cities, run
u factories and onnec our roads.
When ell of these could be easily
within our reach if the capitalists in
every county in the South were to
join forces with the producers of our