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Vol. 5. No. 36.
GASTONIA, N. C., SEPTEMBER 7, 1911
One Dollar a Year
(by j. z. green)
I don’t mean for you to shoulder your old
musket, for that’s not the kind of fighting that
needs to be done. It's a business fight that we
are in. and we must either stand up like full
grown men and do our duty, or we must sur
render like cowards and weaklings to a gang
of commercial pirates that have conspired to
take this year's cotton crop, and cotton seed
included, at a price belozu cost of production.
The time has arrived for plain talk and that is
why I put my name at the head of this epistle.
There are some things that need to be said and
I want to assume personal responsibility for
saying them.
There is less cotton carried over from the
last crop than has been in sight since thq Civil
war. I have seen men on the road eagerly
hunting “spot cotton” for spinners, for the
simple reason that spinners can’t make good
>arns out of “futures” written upon tissue
paper. The rea.son there is less visible supply
of cotton now than has been in sight in^ any
year in a half century exists in the fact that
for two years just past we have had two
abnormally short crops, something that never
occured before. Two years of high-priced
cotton has brought to the South a period of
prosperity never before witnessed in this
country. It wouldn’t take many years of such
prosperity to make the South commercially in
dependent. With a zuise use of our natural
monopoly of cotfan production, it wouldn’t
take many years to transfer the financial centre
from New York to New Orjeans, and the
only way for the gamblers and financial con
spirators, under leadership of Morg9.n and
Rockefeller, to prevent this change in favor of
the South is to hammer dozan the price of cot
ton. They can’t cry down the price of cotton
successfully without government aid, and the
government played into their hands again this
year by sending out a false, misleading, prema
ture crop report that indicated a fifteen-million-
bale cotton crop. This first report came out
before some of the cotton seed had sprouted m
the fields. It is a well-known fact that nothing
like an accurate estimate of the cotton crop
can be made until frost comes in the South,
and there is absolutely no reason why there
should be any government report before the
middle of October, except to afford an oppor
tunity for cotton gamblers to play the game at
the expense of the men, women and children
in Southern cotton fields. The government
does not give publicity of this kind to the busi
ness of the manufacturing classes of this
country, by making estimates of the probable
output of their various productive enterprise^,
and I would like for somebody to give me
even a puny little excuse for this criminal
meddling with the farmers’ business. Even
an accurate estimate of the crop which farm
ers have to sell can not l>e' defended by the
ethics of business which allows the profes
sional classes to have business and professioHal
secrets and which in all history has permitted
the business classes to have business secrets,
but when a government not only persists in
giving publicity to the farmers’^business, but
gives a kind of publicity that snatches from the
pockets of the tillers of the soil more than two
hundred million dollars and puts it into the
pockets of European and American cotton
spinners, it shows a favoritism that borders
well-nigii-upon the criminal.
But students of modern governmental prob
lems, who have watched the course of events,
are not surprised that our national govern
ment should lend aid to the “special interests”
of this country, because predatory wealth hao
owned our national government for nearly half
a'century, but when I see reports from men
in the employ of our State department of agri
culture that are on the “bear” side of the cot
ton market, it makes me wish heartily for these
men to keep their mouths closed unless they
can talk in the interest of the Southern farm
ers who pay their salaries and travelling ex
penses. I have seen it reported in the press ot
the State that certain employees of the State
department of agriculture of North Carolina,
who have been engaged in farmers’ institute
work, give it as their intelligent(?) opinion
that there will be an average crop of cotton m
North Carolina, and when I see hundreds of
acres in the Piedmont section that will not
produce enough cotton to pay for the fertil
izers used, this thing just grates on my nerves,
and I can’t help it. Why should men who are
paid by farmers get on the side of the bear
speculators by giving out such reports ? The
State could afford to double the salaries ot
such “reporters” if they would sign a contract
to keep silent and not let the public have their
estimates. Hon. Chas. S. Barrett never made
a more significant utterance than when he
said: “A great many people are, with honest
motive, striving to help the .fanner produce
more goods at less cost and labor. They really
want to help him. And then there are a few
who are urging him on to production that
prices may drop and everybody get a lift—
except the farmer.” No one appreciates the
enthusiasm of the folks who are doing what
they can to teach the farmer how to produce
more stuff than I do, but when that enthusiasm
strains a point to report results by giving to
the press premature big crop estimates, which
European and American spinners and bear
speculators would be willing to pay a big price
for, I feel like registering a protest. The crop
estimate of last week, as sent out by the
national government, was nearly two millions
bales less than the first estimate. The next i e-
port will, no doubt, be still lower.
Hold on to your cotton and cotton seed.
Don’t be stampeded. There never has been, a
time in history when Southern patriotism and
Southern manhood needed to assert itself as
it is needed now. Under the leadership of the
Farmers’ Union we won the fight in the panic
of 1907. We have a better fighting chance
now. than we had then, and we can win the
fight—we will win the fight, if we act the part
of grown men! Southern prosperity hangs in
a balance. The farmers’ interests are directly
affected, and all other legitimate interests are
indirectly concerned. The Southern mer
chant, banker or professional man who refuses
lo line up in support of the holding movement
is a traitor to the South’s financial interests
and isn’t entitled to the respect and confidence
of his neighbors.
From State Business Agent.
Dear Bro. Members:—I wish to announce
that fall prices on fertilizers and materials
are ready to send out to our members. Am
glad to tell you prices are lower than ever be
fore. Will be glad to furnish these prices with
other Union price lists and literature. Write
for same, but in doing so, write under seal of
your local, or make yourself known. Stand
loyally by the Union, purchase your fertilizers
through your State Business Agent, by doing
so you help to build up our Trade Systeiyi, and
at the same time save money for yourself. If
it was not for the Union and our strong co
operative trading system, fertilizer would be
from "3 to 5 dollars higher per ton- There
fore it is your duty to buy your fertilizer
through the Union and help keep prices down.
I am glad to serve you at any time.
Yours- fraternally,
J. R. RIVES,
State Business Agent.
Sanford, N. C., Aug. 30, 1911.