The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1912-12-14
The South Comes Into Its Own

DOTTED up a section without a no.
table influence in the worlds affairs
Inc vast resources Of Southern man.
hood were almost unused in the Ma
tonal service. A famous editor speak
ing in Birmingham, Ala, referred to
TO South as "disinherited in the house
OF it's fathers"
But after weary waiting. how glor-
iClsly has the South at last come into
lts own. This month for the first
TINE in more than sixty years, the
United States has elected President
man born south Of Mason and Dix
on's llne-for the first time. in fact.
since old Zachary Taylor, Of Louis
iana, was chosen PRESIDENT in 1S48.
the year gold was discovered in Cali
1ornia, only four years after the first
telegraph message was sent, and while
steam engine was rare a sight as
flying machine today and when the
institution of human slavery still ex-
listed and half Of America was
rough and poineer country. Wood
row Wilson is indeed the first man
ever seriously considered for the
presidency whose family was in syn-
pathy with the Confederate cause in
the struggle Of the sixties, and the
fact seems to have been hardly
thought OF in the North-and but lit
tie in the South, so far have we put
civil War thoughts behind us. The
South may also recall with gratifi-
cation that the new Presidents chief
campaign opponent, Mr.. Roosevelt
himself, boasts of being half a South
erner, and kinsman of men who
wore the gray; while the retiring
PRESIDENT of the United States has
proclaimed that one Of his greatest
ambitions has been to wipe out the
last trace of feeling between the se.-
tions.
After its more than forty years
wandering in the Wilderness, there
lore, the South seems indeed to have
come at last into the Promised Land
and new era seems to be begin
riLs. Put face to face with vaster
and more momentous issues, we
:hall grow broader men and South
e"n craftsmanship will again win The
recognition of the Nation. In agricui-
ture, in manufactures, education. poll
tlcs-in all things there should be
the thrill of a new life. Our race
problem, the most serious menace to
our growth, is becoming relatively
less oppressive. We have already
quoted figures showing that the per-
centage of increase in white popu-
lation, 1900-1910, was twice as large
as the percentage of increase in COL
ored population; and the problem VIII
become still less oppressive as we get
more thrifty settlers from the North
and West to help increase the white
population in our rural districts and
Again, not many months hence, we
snail see the opening of the Panama
Canal, the severing of the link that
has heretofore bound together the two
Americans like Siamese twins-prob-
ably the most important change in the
physical earth since the Almighty
finished the work of creation. With
the Canal will come a shifting of the
worlds trade currents, and the South
being nearest to the Canal. should
Profit most largely by it. Railroads
that have heretofore run east and
west-from San Francisco to Chicago
and st. Louis, and from ST. Louis and
Chicago to New York, Philadelphia
Eoston-these will begin to turn
more and more toward Galveston and
New Orleans and Mobile and Sa-
'annGh and Charleston. The great
and symmetrical development which
slavery prevented before the Sixties.
and which war and Reconstruction
ana the Negro problem have since de-
layed--this seems at last to have
come to its time of lowering and
frutinS; like a tree which has sur
vived a thousand storms and tempests
and gathered greater strength for its
SUMMER days.
Splendid, indeed, is the opportunity
ahead of the South. 1t would seem TO
lack but one thing to become one of
the most interesting and promising
sections of the whole 'world-the
thorough education of all its people.
Al our other advantages will avail
us nothing if we fail TO give ade-
quate and practical schools to our bows