Newspaper Page Text
PAGE SIX
Os Interest to the Wealth Creators
VOICE OF THE SOUTH CARO
LINA FARMERS?
The Farmers’ Alliance that was
such a power in the South eigh
teen and twenty years ago, and that
under different auspices might have
accomplished much for the better
ment of the farmers, was worked to
a frazzle by the politicians. The
farmers boosted their “leaders” into
more or less fat offices, and the net
result of the Farmers’ Alliance go
ing into politics was that the real
working farmers were left holding
the bag, with no benefit either in
finances or principle, and the people
in general got a more or less incom
petent set of public servants. In
other words, the politicians bamboo
zled the confiding farmers, and the
great energy of the “farmers’
movement” was diverted from the
channel where, if diligently directed
it would have benefited the produc
ers, to where it helped only the sel
fish office-seeker.
After the death of the Grange, it
was freely conceded that it was killed
by politics. When the Farmers’ Al
liance succumbed there was no dif
ference of opinion among the doctors
that conducted the post mortem —
“fatally contaminated by politi
cians.” So when the Cotton Grow
ers’ Association was organized it was
the universal acclaim that it should
be a “business organization,” and
shun politics as virtue shuns sin.
That organization has really accom
plished much for the farmers, and
indeed the South, and is capable of
doing much more. Its moments of
greatest weakness have been those
when it has seemed that political tac
tics rather than business sense would
be its policy. In those moments it
has lost something in membership,
and something in that strength which
comes only through the confidence of
the general public.
Now we come to the Farmers’ Un
ion, which has just held a State con
vention at Greenwood. There is
work, good, beneficial work, for an
association of farmers. They can be
mutually helpful; they can do much
to improve the standard of labor, to
prevent contract-jumping, and to as
sist each other and the country gen
erally. But there is no helpful place
for such an organization in politics.
There is no place for farmers at
tempting to control the management
of other businesses. For example,
we find this resolution, reported by
J. Belton Watson, member of the
legislature from Anderson, adopted
by the State convention:
We wish to go on record as being
unalterably opposed to the foreign
pauper element being distributed
among the manufacturing interests in
this state and other Southern states,
and ask that the state support of the
immigration bureau be withdrawn
and our state and national represen
tatives are hereby requested not to
encourage this pauper immigration.
Mav we ask if the fanners of
South Carolina are opposed to the
mills of South Carolina running to
their full capacity? Do the farmers
of South Carolina wish to curtail
WATSON’S WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN.
the consumption of cotton in South
ern mills, and by that curtailment
in demand reduce the price of raw
cotton? Do the farmers of South
Carolina wish the manufacturers of
New England to hold at a disadvan
tage the Southern mills, causing a
reduction of Southern mill profits,
and militating against the welfare
of every employe, native and foreign,
in Southern factories? We are sure
they do not. Yet that is what the
spirit of the resolution breathes.
And where is the “foreign
pauper element” that has been
introduced into South Caroli
na manufactories? Do the farm
ers of 'South Carolina term na
tive mill operatives “paupers”?
Where is there evidence of a “pau
per, ’ ’ foreign or native, in the South
Carolina mills? The fact is that no
persons unable to pay their way from
Europe can be now introduced into
South Carolina; another fact is that
the immigration department is much
more interested in bringing here men
capable of purchasing land or farm
ing on shares than in introducing
laborers of any kind; it is more con
cerned in bringing to this state men
that will engage in a hundred indus
trial enterprises, producing here those
things which we now purchase from
other sections. And every increased
inhabitant and every additional in
dustry is of financial benefit to the
farmers of South Carolina.
Had those resolutions been intro
duced at the instance of Northern
labor unions, or at the urging of the
owners of New England cotton mills
that might wish to cripple their com
petitors in this section and so re
duse the consumption of cotton that
the price will decline, we could un
derstand them. Coming, as alleged,
from South Carolinians, they need
explanation.—Columbia State.
OUTLOOK FOR COTTON CROP
There has been wonderful improve
ment in the Texas cotton crop dur
ing the past ten days, and the out
look for a satisfactory yield is now
considered as quite encouraging. For
a time it looked as if the Texa? far
mer on the average would not get
his seed back, as in many instances
almost the entire crop had to bo
planted the second and third time,
and when the plant did come up
it was almost overwhelmed with
grass and weeds.
In this section of the state, as well
as in many others, there is a great
deal of cotton planted in land that
is badly infested with Johnson grass,
and while the cotton was being plant
ed so many times the Johnson grass
wa; growing, and it was a race be
tween the two that would have been
easily decided in favor of the grass
had it not been for the untiring en
ergy of the fanners While thev
have thus been compelled to give
their cotton crop much more atten
tion than usual this year, they have
gone about it in good spirits and have
made every lick count. They have
generally succeeded in getting the
crop remarkably clean and during
the favorable growing weather of the
past two weeks it has made excel
lent progress.
There are some prognosticators of
the cotton crop who express the opin
ion that it is going to exceed that of
last season ih Texas, and predict the
state will make all the cotton this
year that it will be able to gather.
Whether this is true or not, it is
evident that there Is a marked im
provement in the situation and far
mers generally are quite hopeful over
the outlook, many of them, however,
still sticking to the 15 cent propo
sition.
Texas is the greatest cotton pro
ducing state in the union, and the
situation here is always carefully
noted by outside observers. Our fine
prospects are already known all over
the country, and no doubt will be
used as effectually as possible in an
effort to continually hammer down
prices. But the farmers are rapid!v
perfecting a new system of marketing
through the use of warehouses, and
the indications are that they will be
able to control marketing this year
much more effectually than ever be
fore. They seem to be nearing the
point where they will largely put
the speculator out of business, and
are indulging in the hope that never
again will there be any cheap cot
ton. Over-production, however, is a
danger that yet has to be reckoned
with, regardless of the speculator.—
Fort Worth Telegram.
OUR GREAT STAPLE.
The Chicago Record-Herald, under
the head of “Our Great Southern
Staple,” thus discourses:
“The Southern States have been
developing new industries and have
made notable progress of late years
in manufacturing. With all the
changes, however, they have still to
be thankful for cotton. During the
last fiscal year, when our exports
amounted in value to $1,880,851,024,
the exports of cotton alone came to
$481,166,011. This is more than two
and one-half times the value of the
exports of breadstuffs or of meat
and dairy products, and is greater
than the total value of these exports
plus the exports of cattle and sheep
and of mineral oils.
“There was an advance over the
value of the cotton exports for the
previous year of nearly $81,000,000,
the figure for that year being $400,-
427,014. This marked an increase
from $379,743,454 in 1905 and from
$370,505,583 in 1904. In two of the
four years the value of the cotton
exports alone was greater than that
of the other exports mentioned, and
in the other two years it was nearly
equal to the value of those exports.
“While this exporting is going on
there is a large home consumption of
cotton, the number of bales produced
in 1904-’OS being 13,557,000, the
number exported 8,033,793. But
whatever the home consumption may
he, the world depends upon our
Southern States as its chief source
of supply. A failure of the Ameri
can crop would paralyze the cotton
manufacturing industry. The Brit
ish consumption alone in one year is
greater than the output of all coun-
tries except the United States, and
many a foreign town owes its pros
perity to our Southern cotton
fields.”
This great cotton product is not
only the South’s but the Republic’s
greatest commercial asset.
Foreign people who buy our bread
and meat and out petroleum are not
absolutely obliged to buy them, be
cause-they can be gotten elsewhere.
Ours are cheaper and at the same
time better, but those products can
he found in other countries, and in
many cases nearer home, but they
must have nut cotton, because it can
not be procured elsewhere in the
world.
This, however, is no reason why
our producers should undertake to
make the world of consumers realize
that American cotton can be treated
as a monopoly and held at exorbitant
prices. Whenever cotton shall be
put out of reach of the masses it
will go out of consumption.
Those persons who can wear linen
and silk do so no matter what may
be the price of cotton, but the
amount of it consumed by such peo
ple is only a trifle. The great mass
of the cotton is worn by the great
masses of the world’s population,
and those masses must be able to
buy it with such part of their earn
ings as may be available for the
purpose.
Raise the price of shirts out of
reach of the masses and they will
give up cotton and wear paper, which
ingenious manufacturers will maka
for them. If our cotton crop were
held at the exorbitant prices that are
sometimes proposed, and there should
be no relief from the extortion, the
cotton monopolists would come to
the fact that when the masses are
ruled out of the market there will
be no market.
What we should continue to do is
to make cotton for the great masses
of mankind and sell it at such figures
as will pay our planters a fair profit
and still be in reach of those for
whom the cotton is grown. Then we
of the South will continue to control
the cotton supply for a century to
come. But all the time we must re
member that we are working for the
people, not for the wealthy few.—
New Orleans Picayune.
• , - t
——- • I ...
ALABAMA COTTON MILLS.
The census bureau puts the number
of spindles in Alabama in 1905 at
772,727 as against 419,968 in the year
1900, and 79,234 in 1890, and 49,432
in 1880 .
Although the state’s figures for
1905 are disappointing, yet the rate
of increase officially presented is as
large as any other state presents. So
long as we keep on increasing our
spindles as fast as our neighbors in
Georgia and Carolina do, we have
little room for despondency.
Our Alabama mills in 1905 held 11.-
480 operatives whose annual wages
amounted to $2,457,928. The home
mills consumed 198,820 bales of cot
ton in 1905. According to the census
we had in 1905 but 46 cotton mills,