Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1910-02-15
# better patronage, youl

preacher a larger salary, your county
and state better resources, so that your
roads, schools and school houses viii
all feel and show the thrill OF new
power that has come to them.
Every man who comes into the COM
munity with new talent or skill, Ger
man says, every man trained by any
method to greater efficiency and dyna-
mic intelligence-every such man lifts
the whole level or prosperity for the
community. No matter what you have
to sell-your muscular labor. your
skill, your scientific knowledge, your
manufacturing product, your land-you
get for 1t In proportion to the efficiency
and prosperity of the average man
with whom you deal and the great
masses in the community must be in
telligent and efficient II the general
level of prosperity is to be high.
THE farmer, the common laborer of
any sort, needs no training. Educate
him and you spoil him. The poorer
you keep him the richer will be the
upper classes" These have been our
great pet fallacies. And long time
have they been preached
Hugging this vampire delusion, the
southern plantation owner has seen
vast areas abandoned to broomsedge
and gullies, In spite of the fact that
intelligent handling would have kept
them productive for 1000 years. :.
Preaching this fatal doctrine, the
merchant has sold western meat and
scooters and tobacco, when, with
prosperous patrons, he might have
quadrupled his profits by selling sulky
plows and harvesters and carriages
and pianos.
Deluded by. this fallacy, the states
man has struggled against fate, only
to die and be forgotten by people too
poorly educated to read his biography,
and too poor In property to build a
monument to his memory, while
smaller and meaner men in sections
unshackled by these ancient errors, are
famed In song and story.
Writing editorials in support Of the
aristocratic instead Of the democratic
theory Of industry, the editor mas seen
his patent-outside weekly fail to sup
port, when properly trained AMI
educated people would have brought
him wealth and the head of prosper
Gus daily.
Fighting public taxation for better
schools and methods Of training or en-
riching the average man, your man.
ufacturer has struggled along with a
small business, when prosperous
average man would have given us
great industries like those in the
north and west.
Still arguing that education and
training would spoil the workingman,
and that cheap labor is what we need,
your banker has complained that the
south offers no opportunities for the
great fnancier, forgetting that cheap,
unprosperous labor means small, un-
prosperous banks.
Your doctor, lawyer. preacher. teach
er-each falling In -line-~w with the an-
cient heresy--has paid the penalty. In
diminished fees, diminished salaries,
diminished influence.
Victims Of the vicious teaching, !
am pointing out, our men OF talent
artist, sculptor, poet, orator-have
too often fled to other sections or else
among a people unframed to appre-
ciate their genius-when but for
these things you might see statues Of
southern leaders in all great Ameri-
can cities the work Of southern artists
in the worlds greatest galleries. the
thought Of the southern poet the COM
mon 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 be-
hind us.
OF all our errors, our greatest has
been the failure to recognize the fact
that the prosperity Of every man de-
pends upon the prosperity, (and there
fore upon the intelligence and eff
ciency) Of the average man-and In
many cases the actual acceptance Of
the doctrine that the state Is benefited
by having cheap. unintelligent labor.
We now 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 de-
pend upon the prosperity Of the aver
age-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 is the one and only pos
tive guarantee Of southern prosperity,
and by this I mean the prosperity not
only Of our section and of our institu-
tions and of society as whole, but the
prosperity Of every individual-every
farmer, every laborer, every merchant,
every manufacturer every professional
man, every nhabitant-from the boy
who blacks your shoes to the master
mind that builds railroad systems or
governs your state.
TNwER NE RhBEI