This fact was noted by that careful English observer, T.M.

Young: "Whether the cost per unit of efficiency is greater in the South than in the North is hard to say.

But for the automatic loom, the North would, I think, have the advantage.
Perhaps the truth is that in some parts of the South where the industry has been longest established and a generation has been trained to the work, Southern labor is actually as well as nominally cheaper than Northern; whilst in other districts, where many mills have sprung up all at once amongst a sparse rural population, wholly untrained, the Southern labor at present procurable is really dearer than the Northern[1]." This does not mean that Southern labor is permanently inferior; but a highly skilled body of operatives requires years for its development.
[Footnote 1: T.M.Young, _The American Cotton Industry_, p.

113.] In the beginning there were no restrictions upon hours of work, age, or sex of operatives, or conditions of employment.

Every mill was a law unto itself.