The Albany News. (Albany, Tex.), Vol. 25, No. 2, Ed. 1 Friday, May 29, 1908 Page: 2 of 8
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THE ALBANY NEWS
/SSTfiD EYkRY FRIDAY MORNING.
RICHARD H. ricCARTY, Editor and Prop.
Kntcrtxl.at tho PO.st Oltic*' a' Albany. Tvxa.s. as Swond ("las.s Mail Matter. &
SUBSCRIPTION Si.so PER YEAR IN ADVANCE.
ADVERTISING RATES.
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10 crrjt per line. tir.-»t insertion; .*> «>* *}£•"• per line for eat h sub.s«<|.ii«»nt insertion.
Friday, May 29. 1908.
POLITICAL PROPAGANDA IS ANTI-PROSPERITY.
"Whenever the railroads protest against laws and
rulings reducing their revenues or double taxing them
the. protest is called a "howl" by those interested in
keeping class prejudices alive as a means of holding
voters in line for political purposes.
It is asserted that the roads only allege hard times
and failing business for effect to head oft' "wholesale
legislation."
Even the governor of Texas has-been quoted as-
saying Texas will have more new railroad mileage this
year than usual. •
This is equal to saying that farmers build more
barns during a short crop year than during a year of
abundant harvests.
It is inconsistent and unreasonable.
That the railroads of Texas are feeling the after-
ali'ects of the panic and the unequal exactions of State
tax laws and assessment laws is beyond question.
This is proven not only by what railroad men say
which might be to some extent theory and sentiment,
but by what they do, which is a matter of strict busi-
ness. Right now some of the roads, and among those
reputed to be the most prosperous, the section men and
bridge forces are working only five days of a week.
This is a hardship on the men who do the hardest work,
but the companies have to cut expenses somewhere and
in some way.
When they attempt to reduce wages, the President
of the United States is appealed to.
-When they take off trains that are not paying, the
commission jumps on them.
If they try to close small stations the State says
they must not do it.
Hence, the only possible remedy is to economize in
the purchase of materials and reduce the forces or the
working days in the mechanical, maintenance or other
departments.
The laborers affected in the maintenance depart-
ments of all the Texas roads are largely citizens of the
locality where they work. Their families and homes
are there and the prosperity of these men is a matter of
interest to merchants and other furnishers of supplies.
The less time they work the less able they are to buy.
The lailroad trade is an important factor wherever
a railroad pay day is known.
In some places having several railroads this trade
is the very life of the towns and cities.
The common sense and practical thing for the mer-
chants who have goods to sell, the butchers and bakers
who have meat and bread to sell, the farmers and truck-
ers who have various things to sell to railroad employes
who do not compete with them, when the purchasing
power of such men is reduced and trade is affected, is
to find out who is doing the devilment and use their
votes and influence to remedy the trouble if possible.
It can be set down as a certainty that the railroads
are not cutting down forces and reducing working time
from choice but from necessity in some way brought
about. To keep full forces working every day in the
week would be a self-protecting proposition to keep
branches of the companies' business up to the best effi-
ciency and their property of all kinds from the roadbed
to the round house in the best condition. A different
policy is pretty good evidence that it is one of necessity
and not of choice, so far as the railroad managers are
concerned.
If the trouble lies in a needlessly hostile attitude of
the State, as represented in the legislatures, the people
can help general trade conditions and prosperity by
notice to their members of the lawmaking bodies that
they are not being elected solely to exact every possible
dollar from the corporations regardless of fairness and
equity. To do this the people need not surrender a
single one of their own rights, but merely let all citi-
zens and all classes of business in on the ground floor
of equal rights to all.
Prosperous railroads and more of them, working
full forces in every department on full time, are a good
thing for all kinds of business.
Reduced railroad pay rolls react on general business
and affect some kinds directly and seriously without
helping anybody so far as has been found out.
It seems that the people of Texas->would awake to
the fact that a sound business proposition of mutual
good will and common prosperity is better than a polit-
ical propaganda whose fruits are principally official
phims."
FIGHT FOR 15-CENT COTTON.
The Times of New York has had a man in the field
looking over the cotton situation with an idea of learn-
ing just how near to successful the southern cotton
planter is apt to be in his resolution to have 15 cents a
pound for his cotton or not sell it. According to the
Times writer, "the second war of rebellion is now in
full progress thruout the cotton states, and a struggle
for freedom has been inaugurated that will not end
until reconstruction has done its work and victory
perches on the banner of the hosts of King Cotton, who
will never again be dethroned."
There is no question that the mpvement of the
southern planter in demanding 15 cents for his cotton
is a war of rebellion against having a lot of exchange
men and manipulators reap the rewards of high prices
in cotton while he is receiving as return from that
which he produces, a price only a little more than
sufficient to pay for the cost of production. The
planter is fighting the cotton exchange, and he has, at
the present outlook, the best prospects for winning,
notwithstanding the claim of the exchange members
that their organization is indispensible to the welfare
of the market.
The Farmers' Union of America now shows a total
enrollment of 2,500,000 members, and sympathetic with
the aims and determination of these allied tillers of the
soil are fully 500,000 nanaffiliated farmers. The labor
organizations of the country are also in sympathy with
the Farmers' union, from the fact that in a sense it is a
movement along the same general lines as that of labor
organization. The Southern Cotton association is also a
powerful organization which is in the fight for better
prices for cotton, and is composed of owners of planta-
tions of greater or less size, and others who have large
banking or commercial interests directly connected with
the cotton growing industry. The wealth and power
of the Cotton association is enormous in the aggregate,
and its harmony with the Farmers' union forms a - tre-
mendously strong fighting force.
The movement to hold cotton for 15 cents origina-
ted at the meeting of the Farmers' union in Little Rock
last September, and the action was reaffirmed by the
Cotton association in session in Memphis the next day.
The market was then around 14 cents for a remnant of
13,000,000 bales of the previous year's crop, and the
new crop was short. Also planters had in some in-
stances to replant as many as four times before a crop
was assured, and at 15 cents they would have made but
a marginal profit, and the aggregate return from the
entire 1907 crop at 15 cents would have been but little
greater than that received for the 1906 crop. After the
price was determined upon, the panic of October came.
Cotton growers were no better prepared for it nor no
more anticipated it than any other class of people. The!
situation was such that many who had agreed to hold
for 15 cents were unable to do so. They had obligations'
to meet, and the sale of the cotton at any price had to
be made. Thousands were forced by the calling of
1 loans to sell, and it looked as if the hoped-for victory
would be lost. Early in March, however, a joint meet-
ing of the Farmers' union and Southern Cotton associa-
tion officials was held in Jackson, Miss., to consider
ways and means of looking after the cotton still in the
hands of thegrowers. Memphis banks agreed to finance
a large amount of Arkansas cotton, to be housed and
insured in Memphis. April 2 the state presidents of
the Farmers' union held a meeting in Little Rock, and
it was decided to renew the somewhat discouraged
fight in all the cotton states, with the result that the
Little .Rock banks agreed to relieve "distressed" cotton,
and soon there followed a similar action in Missouri,
Tennessee and northern Mississippi. Texas already
had made arrangements by which the crop could be
held by the growers. Bv the middle of April it became
certain that all necessary loans on cotton held in the
southern states would be cared for at a basis of from
$30 to $40 per bale, the loans to run until Sept. 1. With
that very necessary knowledge in hand there went into
the field a thousand workers from the two organizations
to get renewed promises from the growers to hold their
cotton for the desired 15 cents' and to help fight the
thing to.the last ditch.
The prompt actions of the banks and their financial
assistance in the fight has been somewhat of a revela-
tion to the farmer and has done much toward strength-
ening the determination to entirely eliminate the cotton
operator from the business of growing and selling the
■crop. And in the meantime the southern farmer has
been pursuing another policy which will greatly tend to
increase the price of the staple. He has gone in for a
more diversified crop, thereby lessening the danger of
overproduction. The leaders of the tvyo associations
say that a canvass shows that there will be a slightly
less acreage in all the states except Texas and Oklaho-
ma, where the increased planting will be but slight,
and with the present weather conditions the crop can-
not be larger than that of last year,
There is none but will look hopefully for the ulti-
mate victory of the growers in their determination to
sell directly from their own warehouses and for cash to
the buyer and eliminate the needless midj^Bgn's pro-
E. E. WHITNEY
GROCERIES AND HARDWARE
Fine Candies
Cartridges and
Dried Fruits,
Loaded Shells,
Canned Fruits,
Canned Meats,
Canned Fish,
Wyrth's war-
ranted Pocket
Canned Vege-
Knives,
tables*
In lact every-
Tobacco and
thing in Shelf
■ Cigars,
Ha: dware.
Pickles and
Olives,
lacks, Nails'
Olive Oil,
Cox & Gordon's*
and Wire,
Queetrsware
Bacon and
and Lamps,
•Lard,
Flour, Meal and
Lard Cans-
Feed Stuff.
Oil Cans.
SHERVV1N & WILLI AH S PAINTS,
The Best Possible to Province.
Linseed Oil, Turpentine, Putty and
Window Glass.
Subscribe for Ihe News
-
tit. The movement does not necessarily mean a great-
er price paid for cotton, but a greater return to the far-
mer, and it is a statement too old to reiterate that the
farmers' prosperity is the prosperity of all. Fort
Worth Record.
CREDIT TO THE RAILROADS.
"i fc
The Globe-Democrat observes in passing: "A trade
paper estimates that the South ships annually to the
northern markets $100,000,000 worth of vegetables and
fruit. The business grows fast and suggests that the
South will find diversification of crops a great cash pro-
ducer." Thus the tributes come in from time to time
and from various sources to the new spirit of the agri-
cultural South and to the agencies that have helped
largely to arouse this new spirit. The pre ss of Texas
has its share of the credits for intensely advocating di-
versification. The Texas railroads can lay claim to a
very large proportion for having persistently and intel-
ligently advertised the advantages of Texas soil and
climate and cheap lands to the whole country and across
the waters. It is safe to say that, had the roads been
silent(or indifferent and maintained no industrial and
immigrant departments, the cash surplus of southern
vegetables and fruits would not now be over half what
it is. It matters not that the roads were seeking each
to build up traffic for its own lines. Intelligent man-
agement in all kinds of business will do this. But it
signifies a great deal to everybody in Texas that the
State has progressed and is progressing faster all the
time away from the two-crop traditions of cotton and
corn toward a multitude of products and improved
methods of growing and marketing.
A carload of Brownsville cabbage in St. Paul or a
car of Laredo onions in Chicago, a car of Uvalde honey
in Salt Lake City, a car of Beaumont rice in Boston, a
car of Nacogdoches tobacco in St. Louis and half a car
of Alvin cape jasmine blooms in the White House show
that there is something doing all the time in Texas, and
all parts of the North and East are taking due notice.
No well-informed man will deny that the newspapers
and the railroads have been a most powerful and for-
mative influence toward this result, yet we find a Texas
legislature prohibiting the roads from passing news-
paper men to their annual association meetings and
calling such legislation the lruit of patriotic statesman-
ship in response to platform demands.
So far as the newspapers are concerned, the Texas
anti-pass law might have been called "An act to reduce
publicity and prevent as far as possible the interchange
of views on subjects connected with the development
and progress of the State."-Ft. Worth Star.
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McCarty, Richard H. The Albany News. (Albany, Tex.), Vol. 25, No. 2, Ed. 1 Friday, May 29, 1908, newspaper, May 29, 1908; (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth403239/m1/2/: accessed August 15, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting The Old Jail Art Center.