Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1920-01-27
Hoo the Agricultural South
Gan "PlaySafe" and Progress

HERE is seasonable wisdom in the
Southern Ruralist's advice to farm
operators to "play SAFE in 1920 by
planting a diversity of crops instead OF
stalking their all on a single product To
the pursuance of this sound policy we owe
the larger portion of present prosperity in
agriculture and allied interests; and it is
only by continuing and developing this pol
icy that we can insure prosperity for the sea-
sons and years ahead.
High-priced cotton would have advantaged
Georgia and her neighbor States nothing if
they had spent all their profits thereon for
grain meat, forage and other such necessa-
ries, importing them from the distant West
The farm money that has gone into saw
ings banks or Liberty bonds or Thrift
stamps, or into improvements on the home
and the plant the farm money that has
STAYED in the South, enrichlng natlve Dusl-
ness and promoting native enterprise; the
farm money which represents real frultage
of labor and thought instead of mere paper
in an unending series of debts and real
nrogress instead of a mere treadmill-an
is attributable, in the main, to the methods
of that very system, which the southern Ru-
ralist and every other competent counselor
is urging for adoption with redoubled ear
nestness in 1920 For it was not until plant
ers broke free from the kaiserdom of cotton
and won the way to independence by pro-
ducing their own food necessaries, that they
found themselves at the harvests end with
money to save and invest rather than with
notes to renew or all-devouring bills, to pay
And this was the case, as records abundant
ly witness, whether cotton prices were little
or large.
Fvidentlv. then, the one-crop system Is
economically unsound; it fails to WORK IN
even the best of hands; it is pad system
because it brings forth bad fruit NOT only
does il put it's devotees in debt and keep
them there. it also impoverishes their soil,
thus damaging the very source or pros
nerity It exposes them, moreover Jana
with their hands tied), Ito all the uncertain
ties of weather and market. Inc man Win
ONLY one crop has, in a sense, only one chance
against the winds and jolts of fortune;
drouth, a flood a fall of prices may spell
failure to him, or even disaster. But with
several crops, representing diversified OPP
portunities, the planter has hope and means
of retrieving the losses of one season or one
field with the gains of another and OF thus
rounding out a prosperous year.
Of all the favored regions of America,
none perhaps lends itself to this system so
invitingly as does the South for there is
scarcely a species of useful growth that will
not flourish under her friendly skies. Al
Y,
produces approximately one hundred per
cent of the countrys cane sugar, cane syr-
up, early spring vegetables, velvet beans, and
peanuts; ninety per cent of it's rice, sweet
potatoes and tobacco; fifty per cent of it's
peaches, forty-five per cent of it's chickens
and other fowls; thirty-three per cent of
it's eggs; thirty-one per cent of it's honey;
thirty per cent of it's cattle; twenty-five per
cent of it's hogs twenty-five per cent of it's
butter; twenty-four per cent of its apples;
twenty per cent of its wheat; eighteen per
cent of it's Irish potatoes; fifteen per cent
of it's hay; and ten per cent of it's oats.
With resources so varied and bountiful as
this record indicates, the South has shad-
ow of necessity for clinging to a one-crop
system On the contrary, it has every incen-
tive to diversification.
Not to practice diversfication at this
doubtful juncture of world affairs would be
more than ever hazardous AS the Southern
Ruralist cogently puts it: 1--WE must play
safe, for there is a lack of certainty about
the future that BODIES i'll to the man who
does not fortify his farming business with
an abundance of food and feedstuffs. This
is no time for plunging head over heels
into anything. It's the best time in the
history of this country to buy home and
settle down to the task of making it the
Kind or home that will contribute most to
the community and to the furtherance of
American ideals. 1t is certainly not a time
for reckless spending. If we can continue
to prosper-and we can-we should look
with reasonable certainty to day not so
far in the future when the South can shake
off the last shackle of that economic bond
age which has held her down for the past
half century; indeed to a day when this
wonderful country of ours can make her
great potential strength count never be-
fore for full development of every phase
of our lives
The call to freedom and to useful power
GENES TO the South of today with trumpet
rings. Every sign of the times warns us
and inspires us to make the most of the
divers talents with which this goodIy re-
gion is endowed; not trusting to one crop
to the exclusion of other rich and highly
essential realms of production, but so util-
izing our varied resources that we shall
become altogether self-sustaining and a lib
eral storehouse for the wants of the world
That is the safe policy, the right policy
the policy which mercantile and banking
interests should encourage farmers to fol
low. And now that another seed-time
draws near it is especially important thai
this gospel of wise planting be urged anew