The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1909-02-03

tors of the greatest gold-producing
staple in the world, are poor. They
are in practical servitude. 1t is a
tragedy of contemporary life that
they who produce for the world the
commodity without which modern
civilization and industrial life could
not proceed are themselves absolute
ly subservient and the poorest paid
toilers in the United States. Intel
lectually the cotton-growers are sur
j., rounded and coerced by factors which
have no other purpose than to keep
them in this benighted vassalage.
From this condition influences of a
new American spirit must liberate
them.
Millions, and We Waste Them.
This is a tale of commercial in
eptitude. Our greatest asset is our
greatest humiliation. Cotton is king,
but it is a badly served monarch.
Other nations, by far-sighted policy,
intense activity and commercial alert
ness, have overcome the tremendous
advantage we have, and by beating
down the price of the raw product,
and with cheap labor on looms and
machinery for the manufacture of
the finished product, now control the
markets of the world. In the Orient.
where we once had our share of
trade, the market, to say the least,
is slipping from us. 1t seems almost
traYesty on American business
methods that English and German
manufacturers can go on the docks
at Galveston and take our raw cot
ton, carry it to Europe in subsidized
ships, weave it with cheap labor, re-
transport it to the United States, pay
the customs duty and undersell our
home manufacturers. There is some
thing wrong here, isn't there?
Our Successful Rivals.
Thus it is cotton, and cotton
alone, that can make America per-
manently unique and supreme among
the nations. This fact makes gro
tesque the record of our unsuccess in
selling finished cotton products
across the sea-, The only foreign
customer that counted at all i'm
pOrtantly in the totals of our export
trade was China, and our market
there has pitiably declined. Eng
land, Germany and Japan are fore
ing our ships from the Pacific lust
as they crowded them off the paths
of the Atlantic We should be car
rying cargoes of cotton goods to all
the ports of the earth. Instead of
that the nations send here for so
per cent. of their raw supply manu-
facture it into all forms of commO-
dities, outsell us in all the worlds
markets, and even successfully shin
he manufactured goods back to the
Americans who produce the raw sup
ply.
We Might BE Supreme.
One word from America that II
would withhold supplies of cotton
would bring all Europe to terms of
comfy
We smile at the short-sighted folly
of that day, and yet the progress in
the use and manufacture of cotton
will be as tremendous in the coming
years as in the past There is all
actual kingship for cotton, not only
commercially, but politically; and
this sovereignty of cotton in Ameri-
ca | believe to be at hand.
We shall awake to our new des-
tiny as a world-power and trading
nation when We realize fully that the
southern section of our republic is
virtually the exclusive source of a
commodity absolutely indispensable
to the myriads of mankind from
New York to Shanghai, from Nome
to Montevideo, from London to the
Cape.
What the South Needs.
The south needs to be taught
something about cotton. The plant
ing and cultural methods are still
crude The handling and 10orIyo+iDo