Emancipation and Cotton—The Triumph of British Policy [pp. 509-526]

516
EMANCIPATION AND COTTON.
pounds, of which 1,154,000,000 pcunds were from the United States and the
East Indies, leaving but'61,900,000 pounds from all other countries, or an increase of only 760,000 pounds during the year! I1er efforts, then, in other
countries, had been almost a failure. From 1857 the prices remained more than
two cents higher per pound than during the five preceding years, and thus a
great stimulus was afforded to the American planter to increase his cultivation.
But while the prices richly remunerated him, they were at least one cent per
pound too low to allow of any serious competition from India. At 12 55-100
cents per pound, in 1857, the East Indies sent to England 250,300,000 pounds;
but in 1858, at 11 72-100 cents per pound, only 138,200,000 pounds were forwarded from that quarter. It became plain, therefore, that if the American
planter could keep the price of cotton below about eleven cents a pound, he
could retain the monopoly of the markets of Europe, by preventing an increased
supply from India. But here, at this very point, a diffeculty presented itself.
The increase of the demand for cotton, as has been estimated, would equal five
per cent. per annum, were it practicable to augment the production to that extent, and the American planter could only increase it in the ratio of three per
cent.
Thus, an important question arose, as to who should supply this demand.
The American planter could not do it, except by extending the area of slave
labor; and the British people dare not attempt it, while cotton maintained the
low prices which had prevailed. The English introduced the coolie system of
labor, to revive their lost fortunes in their tropical colonies; and, fearing the
Americans would renew the slave-trade, they again commenced their efforts to
prevent such a result. It was readily perceived, by English manufacturers
and statesmen, that if the slave-trade should be renewed by the United Statesan opinion for which there never was any just foundation-all their hopes of
regaining the monopoly of tropical cultivation, as well as their expectations of
divorcing themselves from the cotton planters of the United States, would be at
an end. It was of the utmost importance, therefore, that such a calamity to
England, as the renewal of the slave-trade by the United States, should be
averted at all hazards. It was almost equally important, also, that American
slavery should be kept within the limits where it then existed, and prevented
from extending to new and more productive fields of cultivation. And why?
Because, after all the efforts made by Great Britain to promote cotton culture
throughout the world, there had been no considerable increase, in the aggregate,
excepting in the United States and the East Indies. What was the fact at that
moment? These "other countries," in 1800, supplied 48,000,000 lbs. of cotton;
and in 1859 nearly 62,000,000 lbs., presenting an increase in 59 years of about
14,000,000 lbs. only.
These were startling results, truly, to those who had been flattering themselves that British capital and enterprise could force the cultivation of cotton
in new fields of production, or augment it in old ones from which thle original
supplies had been obtained. There is, therefore, no disguising the fact that, at
the opening of 1860, the East Indies and the United States were the only
countries from which increasing quantities of cotton had been obtained to any
extent, and that it could not be greatly increased in the East Indies until prices
should rise to at least the standard of 1857.
In 1860, then, the United States and British India were the only prominent
rivals in the great cotton markets of the world. The American planter had the
decided advantage in the contest for supremacy in very many respects, but still
he had obstacles to overcome of a very stubborn nature, among which, as already stated, were the difficulties in the way of the extension of slave labor.
To retain his monopoly of the cotton markets, he must not only increase his
production, but, at the same time, keep the prices depressed below the rates at
which it could be supplied from India. To allow any measures to be adopted
which would greatly diminish the production of American cotton, and so enhance its price, would be to promote the interests of the East India planters,
and enable them successfully to rival those of the United States. That the
slave-trade should not supply additional labor to the American planter, was