The Robesonian., 1910-07-25

LlC S1CdC llIldIlSlCI, 1O1SCCCIllS
that cheap, unprosperous labor
means small, unprosperous banks.
Opposing taxation for better
schools, the railroads, hauling
cotton in the fall and low.grade
fertilizers in the spring, have
fought passenger rate reduction
as life and death matter when
a well-trained people would sup
ply the various traffic and the
heavy dividends of other Sec
tions.
Your lawyer, doctor, preach
er, teacher, each falling in line
with the ancient fallacy, has
paid the penalty in diminished
fees, famished salaries, dimin-
ished influence.
Victims of the vicious teach
ing | am pointing out, your
men of talent artists, sculptors,
poets, orators-have too often
fled to other sections, or else have
died with visions unfulfilled
among a people unframed to
appreciate their genius, when
but for these things you might
see statues of Southern leaders
in every Southern city. the work
of Southern artists in the worlds
great galleries, the thought Of
the Southern poet the common
heritage of mankind. 1t is not
that we have had no mighty
dreamers it is that they sleep
in neglected graves trampled
under foot by war and waste
and error.
'Now, war and waste, thank
God! are behind us. Let us also
put error behind us.
The South's Greatest Errors.
"Of all our errors our greatest
has been the failure to recognize
the fact that the prosperity of
every man depends upon the
prosperity of the average man
and in many cases the actual
acceptance Of the doctrine that
the State is benefited by having
cheap, unframed labor. We see,
on the contrary, that such labor
is a curse.
"And our second great error
has been like unto 1.-THE belief
that even if the prosperity of
every man does depend upon the
prosperity Of the average man
we are too poor to train him. The
truth is that we are too poor not
to do so. The fullest and freest
training of the average man is
the one and only positive guaran-
tee of Southern prosperity; and
by this l mean the prosperity not
only Of our section, and Of our
institutions, and of society as a
whole, but the prosperity of every
individual every farmer, every
laborer, every merchant, every
manufacturer, every professional
man: every inhabitant, as l have
said, from the boy who blacks
your shoes to the master minc
that builds your railroad system
or governs your State.
''Teach the farm boy how cotto,
and corn and tobacco may be
} improved by seed selection; how
a plant feeds, and how soils art
exhausted; what elemants ar.
r found in common feed stuffs, ant
r which makes fat and which make
muscle; which COWS make none,
in the dairy, and which should b'
: selected for beef and a thousant
: other things. Not only shoul'
d the elements of agriculture be
n public school study in the rura
t districts, but there should be
n revolution in the textbooks 70
other studies. In yodr spelling
:, book. for instance, Where do 20
n find such words as nitrogen, poi
}, ash, protein, or even such con
e mon farm words as clevis, single
Is tree. mattock, etc. :? Made b
r city people for city people, tt
5. books and teaching have not bee
lr adapted to the needs of the coul
st try children. We shall take
IN long step forward when the far
to boy has proportionately few
or problems in arithmetic about fo
Mt eign exchange and latitude al
nd longitude and the metric syste
X of weights and measures, al
re more about how to calculate
feeding ration for COWS or fe
,rt tilizer formula from certa
ne quantities of potash, phosphol
". acid and nitrogen; and when
mt studies proportionately le
rt, about far-away Australia a.
1u- Kamchatka, and more about t
mt soil that he walks over and plo'
the in every day of his life. The fal
fnn 1oo~- ~q G,