Title: New South, new law : the legal foundations of credit and labor relations in the postbellum agricultural South /
Authors: Woodman, Harold D.
Publisher: Louisiana State University Press,
Year: 1995
Subjects: Agricultural laws and legislation Southern States History; Farm tenancy Southern States History; Agricultural laborers Legal status, laws, etc. Southern States History; Agricultural credit Law and legislation Southern States History; Liens Southern States History
Abstract: "New South-New Law begins with a consideration of the origins of crop lien laws, which conservative southern legislators enacted as a means for landowners to obtain credit at a time when they had little in the way of tangible assets. However, the lien laws soon proved to have unanticipated and troublesome consequences, primarily because many of the laws were construed in such a way that several different parties - not only landowners but also tenants and workers - could give a lien on the same crop. Woodman examines the evolution of lien laws in every southern state and the ways in which the laws created new problems, and then how efforts to solve them produced additional conflicts that the legislatures and the courts sought subsequently to resolve. The new free labor and credit systems that gradually emerged operated within the boundaries that the formal law established, but only in the course of sharp political struggles reflecting the different economic interests and the changing political power of landowners, merchants, and landless farmers, black and white.".
Contents: Ch. 1. "For the Encouragement of Agriculture": The Origins of the Crop Lien Laws -- Ch. 2. "To Regulate the Law of Liens": The Evolution of the Crop Lien Laws -- Ch. 3. "An Obvious Distinction Between a Cropper and a Tenant": The Legal Status of Landlords, Croppers, and Tenants -- Ch. 4. "The Important Business of Farming with Hired Labor": Law and Postbellum Southern Society.