8 Conservative *
the present governor , the Hon. A. H.
Longino , on January 16 , 1900 , and from
Ids many public utterances nnd writ
ings.
From conversations and correspond
ence with the governor , I nm well con
vinced that ho 1ms determined to do all
that lies in his power toward the mate
rial development of the state. His re
cent "Good Roads Proclamation" is in
point.
That the cost per ton to a railroad , of
carrying freight diminishes as the vol
ume increases , is axiomatic.
The staple crop of Mississippi is cot
ton , of which about 185 pounds of lint ,
and say twice as much more , 370 pounds
of seed , have in the United States ,
been , on the average , produced in each
of the last twenty years. This yields ,
all told , 555 pounds per acre.
The staple crop of Iowa and
other Northern states , is com , of
which about 25 bushels , weigh
ing 56 pounds , or in all 1,400
pounds per acre , are produced annually.
That is to say , the potential tonnage
annually grown per acre in Mississippi
is less than four-tenths of that grown
per aero in Iowa.
Moreover , in 1890 , the area of im
proved laud in farms in Iowa was 25-
428,899 acres as against 6,849,390 acres in
Mississippi.
These conditions greatly and perma
nently restrict the volume of the local
business of your railroads , the receipts
from which form , as is well known , the
life blood of railroad revenues.
Traffic in Mississippi is further di
minished by the absence of minerals of
all kinds. Irrespective of coal hauled
for the company's consumption , the Illi
nois Central railroad last year carried as
freight for others , 5,593,076 tons of coal
and coke. None of this was produced ,
and but little of it was consumed , in
Mississippi. You will better appreciate
the magnitude of our coal tonnage
when I say that ijb weighed greatly more
than twice as much as did the entire
cotton crop of the United States , which
amounted to 9,489,559 bales , weighing
2,377,315 tons.
Diversified Crops.
A knowledge of the radically different
conditions surrounding railroad business
in Mississippi , and in the Northern
states , led us , more than twenty years
ago , to promote the diversification of
crops , by inducing fruit culture , mixed
farming and stock raising. Attention
was also given from the start to develop
ing the lumber trade , thereby convert
ing the forests , which had cumbered the
ground from time immemorial , to man's
use and profit.
Other railroads throughout the state
have done and are doing the same
thing.
The results are that wherever some
thing besides cotton is raised , and par
ticularly whore standing timber is con
verted into lumber and other useful ar
ticles of wooden ware , the towns and
hamlets are thriving , roads and bridges
are built and improved , and the people
are prospering as never before.
Another thing , which has , within the
past ten years , happened , to the inestim
able and lasting good of the state , is
the breaking up of the old custom of
planting cotton on credit ; that is , of
liaviug the cotton factors of New Or
leans , Memphis and Mobile , "find" or
finance for the farmers.
Figure it as you may , the charges
made by these gentlemen including
commissions on buying mules , plows and
iupplies , on selling the crop , and the
discounts deducted on notes given-
amounted to well over twenty per cent ,
per annum on the money , or the money
value , actually furnished by the factor
to the farmer.
No Northern state has ever stood , or
is productive enough to stand , such a
charge throughout a eeriesof years , and
yet the South generally , and particu
larly Mississippi after four years of war ,
followed by ton years of misrule , did ,
throughout a generation , under these
circumstances , subsist and grow. This
bears the strongest testimony possible to
the fertility of the soil and the ca
pacity of the people of Mississippi to
work , endure and conquer.
The factors' credits began to be gen
erally withdrawn after the panic of No
vember , 1890 , and today the farmers of
Mississippi are very generally out of
debt. Many parts of the state now en
joy the blessings of mixed farming and
fruit culture , under which crops are
marketed diiring the spring and sum
mer months , thus furnishing the cash
with , which the cotton crop is now so
largely grown.
The development of the material re
sources of Mississippi seems to mo at
least to have been retarded by the fol
lowing causes :
1. Slavery. This created great family
estates , constituting complete civil com
munities in themselves , and thereby
making unnecessary , if not also im
possible , that concert of effort which so
largely , through joint stock companies
and the aggregation of small individual
contributions into vast corporate capital
long siuoo furnished the North with its
banks , factories , turnpikes , canals , rail
roads and other active agencies of com
merce , and has kept them agrowing.
2. The repudiation by Mississippi of
its bonds in 1841 , and again in 1852. Of
this your own historians say :
"There can bo no question that the
repudiation of the Union Bank bonds ,
followed eleven years later by the for
mal repudiation of the Planters' Bank
bonds by the votes of the people , has
proved to have been a most expensive
luxury to every citizen of Mississippi
engaged in any kind of business. "
"The repudiation of the bonds was an
undeniable blunder , and a blunder , ao-
cording to Talleyrand , 'is worse than a
crime. ' "
( A history of Mississippi , second edi
tion , Lowry & McOargle , pp. 292-
293. See also p. 838. )
8. The four years of civil strife.
4. The ten following years of mis
rule.
5. The general , almost universal ,
practice among your best born , best edu
cated and best equipped young men , of
confining their efforts to the learned
professions instead of qualifying them
selves for and embarking in commer
cial , manufacturing and other distinct
ively productive pursuits.
6. The extent to which these highly
gifted and educated young men have
settled in the great cities of the North
and West , and there made fortunes and
reputations which now tie them to
their adopted homes and out them off
from that of their birth.
7. The restrictive policy embodied
in your constitution of 1890 , and in the
laws since passed in respect to corpora
tions.
8. The absolute control of all civil
offices and all political power by one
party , ever siuco the enfranchisement of
the state from the blighting effects of
"carpet bag rule" in 1876.
Touching this last , you know I am
neither a politician nor a partisan , and
yet I can't help saying that while such
domination by the democratic party was
a necessity , that necessity ceased with
the disfranchisement of the more
grossly ignorant elements of the popu
lation. Nor can I help thinking that
there are today , in Mississippi and
throughout the South , thousands of in
telligent , honorable and active men who
would , on strictly national issues , gladly
support the republican party ( under
which , after all , the nation has pros
pered and is prospering ) , if only they
could retain full liberty to control their
own local affairs and their state poli
cies , as to them may seem best , without
dictation from Washington or elsewhere.
For this , things are ripe both at the
North and at the South. As I write ,
the two senators from South Carolina
have tendered their resignations , in or
der to join issue on what is substantially
the question here stated.
No state in the union is more favored
than Mississippi in the fertility of its
soil , in the value of its standing timber ,
or , above all , in the quality of its men ,
their almost absolutely pure American !
blood and their descent from those who
wont to make up the best of it. What ,
then , is lacking to the material develop
ment of the state.
The Disgrace of Repudiation.
If it had been given me to say a few
words of suggestion to the young men
whom you are about to graduate and
send on their journey through life , I <
