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THE COUNTRYMAN.
BY J. A. TURNER.
—“brevity is the soul of wit”—
$1 A YEAR.
VOL. III.
TURNWOLD, PUTNAM COUNTY, GA„ MONDAY, DECEMBER 1, 1862.
NO. 10.
Iron.
“ In a little while, iron will be as scarce
as salt is now, and yet we hear of no efforts
to manufacture this indispensable article.
Salt might have been abundant now, it our
people had commenced making it soon
enough. There is yet time enough to have
iron in abundance, if we go to work at
once, but there is not a moment to be lost.
There is sufficient ore, water-power and
coal in the Southern Confederacy to make
iron sufficient to supply the whole human
family for generations to come. There is
an abundance of unemployed capital and
labor. Shall the government and people
suffer for lack of this greatest element in
civilization ? There are, we believe, inex
haustible beds of ore within 10 miles of
this town, contiguous to water-power and
heavily timbered forests, where iron can be
made profitably. Why don’t some of our
capitalists embark in this business, instead
of speculating on salt, corn, flour, and goo
ber-peas ?”
The foregoing is from the Athens Watch
man.—Why don’t our capitalists embark
in manufactures 1 That is the question.—
The reason is obvious. Nobody can afford
to manufacture any article at a low price.
This is out. of the question. But if they
manufacture it at a high price, they are de
nounced as extortioners, and their property
either seized—lawlessly seized—by gov
ernment agents, or seizure is held up as a
constant terror before their eyes. Our cap
italists don’t embark in manufactures be
cause they do not believe either their rep
utations or their capital will be safe in such
enterprise. With the whole press and
people to hound them down a-s extortion
ers—with a mob without law, or under col
or of law—a mob of private persons or gov
ernment officials, frcm governors down to
corporals, to do violence both to their per
son and their property, no wonder our mon
ied men don’t engage in manufactures.
There is a very unwholesome, and very
hurtful public sentiment or, this subject,
and the press, as I shall presently show, is
mainly to blame tor it. Our government
and people need manufactured articles, and
yet they- whole policy is directed against
manufactories. Instead of fostering and
encouraging them, the whole aim seems to
be to break them down—to thoroughly
crush them out. The consequence is that
our people, our army, and our government
are suffering, and will suffer still more.
At this time there are perhaps a dozen
or more bills before the Georgia legislature,
the effect of whose passage would be to
cripple all the industrial resources of the
country, when the development of those re
sources is just as essential to the salvation
of the country, as is the success of our ar
mies in the field. The motives which in
fluence the actors in this matter, are vari
ous. Some are controlled by want of sense :
some by mistaken motives of patriotism :
while the large majority are playing the
demagogue. All the latter, hearing the
hue and cry of the press and people against
factories and extortion, think to make a
cheap reputation by putting down extortion
and factories. It is a great thing to be
with the crowd.—When you stab at what
is truly extortion, this is all right : but
when you stab at the manufacturing inter
est of the country, you stab at your coun
try’s vitals.
Gov. Brown seized some salt once. l)id
this bring salt down ? Not by any means.
If it had any effect, it raised the price, for
it prevented people from importing it, or
from manufacturing it. The Southern Con-
tederacy learns that there are parties now,
who have salt which they wish to bring in
to the state, but which they are deterred
from bringing, on account of the fear of
inimical legislation, or unlawful seizure.
Nobody is going to manufacture or import
salt, costing them from $10 to $40 per bush
el, when the Georgia legislature threatens
to make them lose from $5 to $35 per bush
el on it. And so it is that this constant in
terference with private property is paraly
zing all industry, and constantly carrying
up, instead of bringing down the price of
things. It onr authorities would untetter
the energy and enterprise of our people,
instead of striking them with dead palsy
all the time, then we might hope that arti
cles needed by the country, would be pro
duced by our people.
This business of seizing private property
is all wrong. Seizing salt don’t produce it,
and unless you produce it, and increase the
supply, you can’t cheapen it. The high
way robber seizes upon a gentleman’s
purse, and it makes the money very cheap
to the robber, but. it does not increase the
wealth of the country of which the bandit
is an unworthy citizen. And so seizing
salt, or manufactured articles, may make
these things come very cheap to the gov
ernment, but it does not add to the supply
ot manufactured articles, and does not ben
efit the country : but the government
stands as a robber upon the highway of en
terprise, and no one regarding his purse,
will travel that way. Government with its
acts of unlawful seizure is like a pirate
craft upon the high seas, and as effectually
blockades all commerce as the corsair on
the ocean. The “ 2:90” doesn’t strike
more terror into yankee ships than govern
ors, legislators, press and people now do in
to all manufacturing industry. And yet it
is asked, “ Why don’t our capitalists go to
manufacturing ?” The answer is plain : it
is because they dread robbers and pirates.
Government, in seizing private property,
if not a robber, is certainly the greatest
speculator, extortioner, and engrosser of
them all. For it not only produces noth
ing, but destroys all the sources of produc
tion, and takes from the producers of the
country what little has been already made.
It has been thought the policy in some
countries, and used to be thought the policy
in the old United States, by some, to encou-
ago manufactures—encourage them to ben
efit the people and country at large. Our
officials and people—(and the press encour
age them in it)—seem to think it our policy
to destroy all manufactures. And their
policy is succeeding very well indeed.
The whole course on this subject has
been wrong. If government does not offer
bounties and premiums for manufactured
articles, it at least ought not to destroy
manufactures. It ought to leave manufac
turers to reap the fruit of their labors. It
ought to protect them in their property, in
stead of robbing them of it. If it had pur
sued this course, manufactories would have
sprung up all over the land, and production
and competition would, by now, have
brought prices down. If our governors,
legislators, people, and press, persevere in
the course they are now pursuing, every
thing will continue to grow higher and
higher, all the time, because while the de
mand will be increasing, the supply will be
shortened, and finally cut off.
As I have said, the press is very much to
blame for this. Editors and newspaper
writers are generally consumers and not
producers. They have had to pay high for
their consumption, while for their only pro
duction—-that is their newspapers—they
have been compelled to take very irremu-
nerative prices. IJence it is natural they
should have pursued the course which they