The Dillon herald. [volume] (Dillon, S.C.) 1894-????, 1919-02-06
URGES CUT IN ACREAGE.
Commissioner Harris Suggests 3d.
100000 Acres Be Planted.

COlumDla, FeD. o-DTdSIlc curldll-
ment of the cotton acreage as coun-
ter irritant to the alleged bear"
propaganda to depress the price of the
stcZle Is advocated by B. Harris,
State Commissioner Of Agriculture,
Commerce and Industries, in state
ment today. The commissioner is Of
the opinion that a 30,000,O00 acre
crop next year will increase the price
of cotton ten cents per pound and
save the South from bankruptcy. His
statement follows:
ALREADY it is being freely predict
ed in high cotton circles that the
cotton growers are going to plant the
biggest acreage ever known. The
report is that this year they will plant
forty million acres. Now this is all
bear dope, they want to scare spot
holders and get them to turn loose
their spot cotton. Pay no attention
to future quotations; they cannot
spin board cotton. The spinner is
out of the market both the European
and the American spinners. They are
looking to the cotton brokers who
are bear spectators to furnish the
mills their cotton, of whom they have
contracts with for future delivery,
and the mills will soon begin to call
on them to fill their contracts. Then
they will put the price up on spot
cotton a little, for ley know some
sucker will bite and they will get
little spot cotton to keep them going
for a short while. No one knows the
farmers better than the bear specu-
lators in the cotton market. They
know exactly how to handle him and
scare him So that he will turn his
spot cotton loose.
81 hope the farmers will learn a
lesson from such bear dope and plant
this year thirty million acres instead
of forty million acre crop. A thir-
ty-million acre crop will add ten
cents per pound on the spot cotton
now on hand, of which there is now
about six million bales in the hands
Of the farmers and merchants. If
this cotton is held for the price set for
it, thirty five cents per pound, it will
add millions of dollars to the South
and save the South from bankruptcy.
1t will also add twenty cents per
pound to the crop we will grow this
year. Figure this and see If it will
not pay you to hold this crop until
the price, thirty five cents is secured.
The way to get this price Is to cur
tail cotton acreage 80 per cent this
better for you to raise ten bales and
get 5000 bale for them than to
raise twenty bales and get 800 for
them? Brother farmers, stop, think
and figure, and you need not be asked
to cut the acreage. All you have to do
is just to use good common horse
sense and you will win this fight. 1t
is in your hands. Will the farmers
do it? 1 believe they will, am proud
to say that the farmers are not the
farmers they were, even two years
ago. The farmer has learned more in
the first thirty days of this year than
he has learned in any ten years of the
past. When you can get man to
think along lines for his success you
have done the greatest thing for him
you could do; he will work out the
rest for his betterment. If you give
man money he will spend it, prob
ably the next day or the same day you
give it to him. If you give him know
ledge he has it all the balance of life
and he can impart it to others, and
all he needs is to come into possession
Of real facts and conditions, and then
he will change his methods OF mar
keting his crops Farmers hold cut
acreage and fertilizers; use well di-
rected brains and victory is yours"