American citizen. [volume] (Butler, Butler County, Pa.) 1863-1872, 1865-09-13
NUMBER 80
A Planters Experience.

cording to the mood or the prepos-
sessions Of the testi6er. The thous
ands who have been educated in the
faith of negro worthlessness-of tho
impossibility of getting work out of
the Black rascals without the help
of horsevhip and pair of revolvers
twill aot be persuaded, though one
rose from the dead" They must be
expected to insist for years that the
South is ruined by Emancipation
that there will be no more Cotton.
Rice or Sugar-that the fields must
return to forests and the '.hands" re-
lapse into the lowest paganism and
barbarism. He has been hearing and
repeating this for the last fifty years, and
must not be expected to change his tune
in moment. Give him time.
On the other hand, there is danger of
unreasonable expectations. Blacks, as a
rule, are less energetic, less persistent
than Whites. They are contented with
less than we consider essential to COM
fort, provided they may thus live easily.
L
ness with freedom and bona fde hard
work in the field and the gin-house or
sugar-mill with Slavery and its unspeak-
able degradations Tell them they are
free, and they want to test the assurance
by taking a trip to the nearest city and
having few days leisure. And then
there are among Blacks,a among Whites,
many who fancy themselves smart enough
to get their living without work and who
at all events win try the experiment.
We have not these ten years had less
than One Hundred Thousand Whites
in this City who are without property,
yet who manage somehow to live-by
gambling, pillering, swindling, keeping
haunts Of vicious resort receiving stolen
goods, and serving in one grade or an
other Of the quartormaster aud commissa-
ry departments of the grand army of Sa-
tan. There is prejudice of color in that
service, but no absolute exclusion and
we must expect to see it recruited by
Blacks who, so long as they were slaves,
were more usefully and ereditably en-
ploycd.
We must not forget that work is, with
most people, only a choice of evils. They
would prefer idleness, but for the fact
that this involves hunger and rags; and
they prefer work with shelter, to idleness
without Take away the pecuniary or
equiva lent inducement, and how many of
our White artisans or laborers would 60
to work tomorrow?
We assume that there are negroes who
won't work, since We know Whites of
Of that disposition. Any one Of wide
odrervation and experience can recall at
least one White who, though poor as
Lazarus, has not done one honest days
work per week for the last ten years, yet
who has begged or stolen a sort of living,
and who is noisily hostile to Eemancipa-
ton, because "Niggers can't take care of
themselves" Some, doubtless, cannot;
others will not.
We lately invited any and every
hearty, old Aboitionist, who has tried to
prosecute any industrial enterprise by
negro labor, and been bafiled by the re-
fusal Of the Blacks to work, to favor us
with his experience for the instruction
and guidance of others. We presume
there must be instances of this, though
we never yet heard of one. We,will con-
slider the first that may reach us.
Meantime, the following, from ono
who planted ten years as stakeholder,
is pertinent 1t is the letter of plant
er in the parish Of Iberville, Louisiana,
to the Newt Orleans Freedmen's Associa-
tion and reads:
"GENTLEMEN: / am planter of twelve
years experience; this year | am work
ing twelve hands, six men and six wo-
men; my laborers are to get one-fourth
of the net proceeds of the crop. They
have full understanding of the interests
in said crops. Our contract was made on
the lst of February last, and the result
so far is a complete success. We have
to-day 50 arpents of cotton 20 arpents OF
sugar-cane; IS arpents of corn--all in
perfect condition. | don't mention the
vegetable crops.
Under the old system, 10 arpents to the
hand was considered fair result, and
more than three-fourths of the plantations
failed to come to that standard.
My laborers are all good people, beha-
wing well, having good common sense;
they are honest and true to their family.
Beside the crop in common, they have
raised fortheir private account small crops
of corn and vegetables; they have poul-
try, &C., Of their own,
Not a single difficulty has occurred
among them since they have agreed
work on my farm.
Thus is the whole labor problem solv-
cd Deal justly, give the freedmen some
interest in their work, and there will be no
trouble In this case, 80 per cent. more
of ground is cultivated than the same
number of hands cultivated under the old
system, and the probability is that the
planter will make that per cent. more
1t is probably best to peg away" at the
old shareholders till they conclude 10 deal
Justly, and thus eight it out ON that line" :"
1t is nothing but sheer usliness on their
part that causes all the trouble and in1icts
all the distress upon the freedmen"
Perhaps this fortunate experience,
yet VIC are confident that most Of those
who go to work in the right spirit, under