6 THE SUGAR INDUSTRY. 



With sugar cane, the industry prior to the war was conducted by slave labor and 

 without much enterprise, the increase in slaves being an element of the profits. The 

 industry was destroyed during the war. It took 20 years thereafter and an expenditure 

 of $21,000,000 to rebuild the levees and reclaim the plantations, and it was not until 1878 

 that Louisiana's product was restored to the figures of 1844115,000 tons. From 1878 to 

 1886 there was much trouble with high water and crevasses, while as early as 1884 an 

 era of low prices set in, which were helped by a reduced scale of duties. Almost any other 

 industry would have succumbed to such adverse influences, but our sugar producers, 

 though discouraged, would not admit defeat. They established an experiment station to 

 learn more about fertilizing and chemical control of sugarhouse work, changed in a 

 large measure to the central factory system just as the dairy people have done im- 

 proved the sugarhouse equipment, and by 1890 had doubled the crop of 1878. Then came 

 the "bounty" period, in which the growth of production in four years was from 165,000 

 tons to 324,000 tons. Then came reduced duties in 1894, following which sudden change 

 many plantations were sold for a song. But the Dingley tariff of 1897 restored fair pros- 

 pects for the cane sugar interests of the United States. 



Another reason why the beet sugar industry did not develop much prior to 1890, 

 was that the United States department of agriculture, discouraged by a few failures, or 

 blind to the merits of the beet root, led a wild-goose chase after sorghum. The possi- 

 bilities of sorghum are not denied, but the practical realities of cane and beets are such as 

 to eclipse sorghum for commercial purposes.. After it had been demonstrated that sor- 

 ghum was not a reliable sugar plant, as compared with sugar cane or the 'beet root, 

 government spent millions of money and years of time upon it. Sorghum could be 

 cheaply raised like corn, was not a "back-bending crop" like the beet. The American 

 Agriculturist did what it could to stem the sorghum craze by showing what the beet 

 sugar industry was doing in practice compared to the meager results of the sorghum 

 theory, but it took years of bitter and costly experience on the part of government and 

 farmers to vindicate our position. So the sorghum craze, fed from national and state 

 treasuries, swept over the country for a dozen years. 



But as it exploded, more work was done with sugar beets, until, when the McKin- 

 ley law of 1890 was enacted, experience had pointed out the way to the success that has 

 since been achieved. But hardly had a few beet sugar factories been established under 

 the McKinley act before its repeal was ordered by the people. In spite of the ensuing 

 uncertainties, the development of this industry since 1894, and especially since 1897, is 

 proof conclusive of its necessity and its advantage to the whole United States. 



Beet culture, however, cannot be learned in a single season. It is high farming, in- 

 tensive horticulture, like the market gardening near our great cities, which is the result of 

 fifty years of experience. Under the best management it takes from two to four seasons 

 for the farmers in any locality to learn how to grow beets to the best advantage. Until 

 this is done, the sugar factory is not assured of an abundant supply of beets of proper 

 quality. Meanwhile the immense investment is at a risk from $350,000 upward in each 

 factory, and at best the factories can run only 100 or 150 days during the year. Experi- 

 ence in this country has demonstrated that where the industry has survived this first 

 stage, it has in every case become well established, to the satisfaction and profit of the 

 farmers, laborers, railroads and capitalists interested in the business. 



And since the world's production of beet root sugar has increased from about 

 2,500,000 long tons in 1884 to almost double that quantity as the average since 1892, the 

 general success of this industry is no longer questioned by any well-informed person. 

 Indeed, nearly two-thirds of the world's consumption of sugar in 1898 came from beets. 



