Rise of the new South.

so large a part in the history of the country, and had produced so many of its greatest men, became a memory.

In the meantime the South was coming to depend less completely on its agriculture. The development of nonagricultural industries can hardly be said to have been a result of the war. It had been delayed in part by the existence of slavery, but it had begun before the war, and the census of 1870 marked practically no progress over that of 1860. During the seventies, however, it secured a strong start. The development of lumber began immediately after the war, and furnished much of the capital which the South so much needed. The exploitation of the iron and coal about Birmingham in Alabama began about the same time. Cotton mills began to spring up in the piedmont region, where the falls of the rivers were to be found, and where the poor white population could be reached and drawn in, hardly any negro labor being employed in the mills. The capital for these mills was generally furnished, half by the neighboring community and half by northern capitalists. The first superintendents and foremen usually came from the North. The poor whites, however, had been accustomed for generations to the making of homespun, and they had a mechanical ability which soon proved itself. The manufacture of cotton so near the source of its production naturally resulted in some economies, and to these was added a saving in the price of labor. The mills were generally located in small villages which became economically dependent upon them, and laborers were unable to compel as good terms as those in the North. The southern states, too, were less active in passing protective laws, and cheaply paid child labor was abundant. This lowering of the labor standard gave financial success, but prevented the production of the finer grades of fabrics, for which skilled and therefore wellpaid workmen are required. In the meantime the southern railroad system was changing as well as developing. The roads,

LABOR PROBLEM IN THE NORTH

437 during the seventies, fell largely into the hands of northern capitalists. They, following the tendencies of that "Railroad Age," developed trunk lines running through from the South to the North, at the expense of the roads running to southern ports. Southern business tended more than ever before to concentrate at New York, and the South did less business directly with England than before the war. These tendencies were in the direction of lessening the differences between the South and the rest of the country, and bringing it into closer touch with the national economic life. The memories of the war, reconstruction, and the negro problem, however, were sufficient to hold it politically apart.

In the North the labor problem produced by the war Labor problem in was also serious. During the war itself it may be estimated the North. that the labor of a million and a half men was withdrawn from industry for three years. For three years, also, America ceased to receive its customary supply of immigrants. It is not entirely clear how this loss was made good. Women worked more than previously. Many children were withdrawn from school to take jobs or work about the farm. Labor-saving machinery both in farm and factory played a part. It still remains true that one can scarcely account for the maintenance of the volume of production at the North until 1863 and its increase after that date, without the supposition that there was a general intensification of effort under the strain of the war. In spite of the scarcity of labor, wages did not at once rise to meet the increase in prices due to the depreciation of the currency. The result was the formation of labor unions of various kinds, which now began to take on their permanent shape. The close connection of the slavery agitation and the labor question secured for the laborers the championship of many of the antislavery leaders, such as Wendell Phillips. By means of strikes and other pressure, wages were generally raised, though even at the end of the war they had not risen as much as prices. At

Land and population.

the same time agitation in Massachusetts and some other states resulted in legislation favorable to labor.

The close of the war threw over a million soldiers suddenly back into private life, and at the same time caused a revival of immigration on a larger scale than ever before. The use of labor-saving machinery for farm and factory, moreover, continued to increase. Yet the expansion of industry was so great that even while the army was being disbanded there was a complaint of a scarcity of labor and the overemployment of children continued and became a permanent condition. The greater number of these laborers found occupation in opening up new farming lands and in the more intensive cultivation of those already broken. In the sixties the system of land distribution reached the climax of its perfection. In the older states cultivated land changed hands easily and at good prices. In Illinois and the surrounding states there were vast areas of well-located land held by railroads, land companies, and individuals, which was sold at reasonable prices and liberal terms as to payment. In Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Alabama, Mississippi, and in all states west of the Mississippi River, there was public domain, which could be taken up under the Homestead Act. This latter land, however, was generally in regions not yet reached by the railroads and attracted those who had little or no capital. West of the Missouri were enormous districts not yet surveyed where the squatter could settle with no outlay, though with constant danger from the Indians. There, cattle driving and the cowboy flourished. These opportunities

were temptingly displayed to the ambitious and dissatisfied all over the United States and northern Europe. States and landowning railroad companies maintained agents abroad, published advertising pamphlets in many languages, and supplied the intending immigrant with assist

ance.