Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-03-07
SOUTHERN COMMERCIAL CONGRESS-
By FREDERIC J. f1ASKIN

full measure because there are not enough
men to till it. North Carolina has nearly
half million fewer acres in cultivation
than it had in 1861, but its prosperous
manufacturing centers produce annually
four times the wealth that the whole
state yielded fifty years ago. South Caro-
lima has not nearly as many acres Of
farms now as when the civil war began,
out the lettuce beds in the immediate
vicinity of Charleston bring IN more
money each year than did the entire cot
ton crop of the state the year Lincoln
was elected.
1t is not that the south is not pros
porous. for it is. 1t is that the south is
not as prosperous as
What the it should be; that 1t is
GIL GIL not able for one rea
son or another to
make the most of its opportunities. That
is why the able and earnest men of the
south are in conference at Atlanta-to
devise ways and means for the complete
physical recovery of the. section.
In recent years no one man has done
more for the south than the Secretary of
Agriculture. James Wilson. He has made
it especially his business to help the
south to realize the enormous possible
ties of its agricultural resources. The
boys corn clubs, the extension of agri-
cultural education, the lectures of the
field agents-all these things are begin
ming to show their effect.
Mississippi, with the richest land of any
state in the Union, insisted upon raising
cotton: cotton. nothing but cotton. Then
came the menace Of the bolr weevil and
the influence of the boys corn clubs. The
result was that Mississippi, which al
ways had imported the corn it fed to it's
live stock, this year asked the railroads
to make rates for corn shipments to the
big grain markets. 1t was not a great.
shipment. perhaps, but it was a most sig
nificant circumstance.
Alabama was the first state in the
Union to establish an agricultural col
lege in each congressional district. Geor-
states are now considering the same
thing. The common schools are taking
up the work, and the south soon will be
quite abreast of any part of the coun
try in this essential feature Of education.
In other movements for the general ad-
vancement Of all conditions affecting the
material and physi-
Fifteen Separate cal condition of the
people the same for
WaTO IeQOeuCE is
evident. In the Atlanta convention the
fifteen sectional meetings will consider
matters relating to fifteen separate move
ments, the nature Of which is indicated
by the name of the sections: Agriculture,
commerce, commercial organizations, edu-
cation, forests, good roads, health, i'm
migration, insurance, land reclamation,
manufactures, public service corporations,
real estate advertising and water re-
sources
Not least among these in importance is
the section dealing with health. The
systematic rural sanitary campaign ever
undertaken in America. The immediate
cause Of this work was the prevalence
of hookworm disease, but the same
evil also will go far toward ending the
ravages of typhoid fever and other
diseases which are the result of insani-
tary conditions. Eleven southern states
now arc working in this campaign, with
more than seventy men in the field. The
results accomplished already are we'll
worth while, and indicate that the hook
worm disease will be stamped out in ten
years time. and that the efficiency of the
southern laboring man will thereby be
increased so per cent.
~
This congress is the expression of the
determination Of the southern people to
take advantage of
TO Seize every possible op-
n:A: portunity to advance
0PPoA s"AAA'Ae0' the material and
moral condition of their section; to re-
move the handicap placed upon it by the
war and it's results, and to place the
south on an equal footing with the other
parts Of the country in a commercial and
industrial sense.
The purpose of the convention is not
SO much to point out the opportunities of
the south as it is to show the way to
take advantage of those opportunities.
It will be an eminently practical confer
ence of practical men engaged in a prac-
teal work.
TOmorrow-CROP REPORTS.