Pre-Depression South

Make no mistake, the South’s municipal and state governments are not following the Big City economic development path. They exist in a world of their own: the non-industrial, marginally urban, cotton-export/plantation agricultural base, characterized less by large cities than small cotton and mill towns. With no immigrant population to speak of, the South was little disrupted from the political/economic system it reconstructed after Reconstruction. Viewing itself as a conquered nation, more precisely a colony controlled by a Big City political/economic hegemony, southern planter elites made a deal with northern finance, railroads and industrialists that installed what infrastructure was need to make the export/agricultural base profitable. A native urban business class, the New South Redeemers, wanted greater industrialization—but, with rare exceptions (Atlanta), were unable to forge consensus from the South’s “divided mind.†Northern elites, however, built major industrial towns (Birmingham), pioneered city-building based on tourism and land sales (Miami) and were rigidly kept out of southern political life through southern state constitutional gift and loan clauses that preserved a southern economic development strategy that balanced industry with agriculture. Around WWI the Great Migration commenced, and the boll weevil made its first appearance. The chapter includes mini-studies of the Charleston and Atlanta chambers and the New Orleans Port Authority. The final theme is the rise of Texas cities. From the Civil War on, it was clear Texas was not part of the traditional “Old South.†We discuss the early Texan business culture, the role of business elites, the huge development role played by the Houston Port Authority and the economic development competition between Dallas and Fort Worth.