508 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. 



To pay for this excess of imports our gold and silver must be used; 

 and the excess of such exports over imports in fifty years amounts to 

 $1,068,561,543. So the excess of these payments over the apparent in- 

 debtedness from excessive imports of merchandise is $849,214,209, an 

 average draft of $16,984,284 per annum for the entire period. It is true 

 that immigrants bring money and other effects, which add to the wealth 

 of our country, and far more than balances the above deficiency. The 

 fact remains, nevertheless, that the domestic production of the United 

 States fails to equal, by a very small difference, the consumption of the 

 United States. 



This matter is understood by intelligent publicists in this country, 

 and is seen in its true light by enlightened foreigners, who admit that 

 nations must be self-supporting if they would live at all, and that the 

 domestic trade of every country must dwarf to insignificance its foreign 

 commerce. The apparent exception of Great Britain, which occupies a 

 peculiar and isolated position, is not an exception, because of the pos- 

 sessions of Englishmen in British colonies all over the world, and in all 

 other countries, especially the United States. The imports of that 

 country are largely dividends and profits on foreign investments, and 

 are thus practically, in a peculiar sense, domestic trade as well. * 



The grain supply will hereafter be in larger proportion for domestic 

 consumption, the cotton demand will continue to move in the direction 

 of larger domestic manufactures, and the pork trade will be in larger 

 proportion consumed at home. These three products, which almost 

 monopolize the export trade, have all been the result of undue stimula- 

 tion, of a disproportionate distribution of farm labor and crop areas, 

 while other products needed for consumption have been unnecessarily 

 scarce and high. The excess of wheat-growing has brought prices to a 

 ruinous point when sound grain can be bought in Dakota for 40 cents, 

 and again in London for a dollar a bushel. It is down close to India 

 rates. 



It is not desirable that cotton or wheat should be neglected, or sub- 

 stituted abruptly by other crops. All of the former that the world re- 

 quires should be furnished, hereafter as heretofore, largely by this 

 country, but the most of it should and will be manufactured here, 

 very largely on the borders of the cotton-fields. But it is very cer- 

 tain, that twenty-five dollars worth of cotton per head will make no 

 community rich ; it is not less cotton that is wauted, but more of some- 

 thing else. The wheat specialist is still less excusable for neglecting 

 other farm products. We have an advantage of the world in cotton 

 production, in soil and climate especially suited to its growth ; we have 

 none over many other countries in wheat production, except in agricult- 

 ural implements. The crudest of agriculture produces as much per 

 acre, the most skilled twice as much. The cheapest of labor competes 

 in its production, and our acceptance of the competition is a confession 

 that we lack the enterprise or the skill to produce what we need more 

 and buy at higher cost. Yet we should rearrange our crop areas slowly 

 and judiciously, producing all the wheat required for home consump- 

 tion, some to give to starving foreign peoples in an emergency, and a 

 small surplus for sale whenever something more than starvation prices 

 are offered for it. Half the present area in wheat should produce all 

 the present product ; when, with rotation and intensive culture, an 

 equal or greater value would result, from the superior cultivation of 

 other crops in the remaining half, and the net profit might be fourfold 

 the present gain. It is a more profitable distribution of crops that is 

 wanted ; it is greater variety, larger aggregate quantity, greater indi- 



