The Vermont transcript. [volume] (St. Albans, Vt.) 1864-1870, 1866-04-13
Labor in the South.

WILKINSON Co, MISS. March Is, &c
To The Editor Of Frank Lesiics Paper:
In your Illustrated Weekly of March
10th, under the head OF clown Cos
sip, i find the following: 1--WE could
suggest locality in this great city,
where some thousands of hard work
ing, sober mechanics and laborers,
with large families, can be found,
inhabiting dark, unwholesome tenant
houses, paying heavy rents for each
stifled room they occupy. How glad
would these overworked and illhoused
people be to get away from their pris-
on homes !" etc, etc
Now let me suggest to them to come
South We need them. In the late
war we staked our labor upon the
sword, and lost. We accept the issue,
however; we have made up our minds
to abide by it; and now we want labor.
You may ask where are our former
slaves? Ali where? Thousands are
dead, large numbers are in the cities,
towns, and villages, throughout the
land, North and South. At low es-
innate, the South is short 10000
laborers for the fields. Those we have
left are not so industrious as they
might be, and therefore we want more
in numbers. But do not think be
cause we ask for laborers, that we
wish to crowd the negro out. 1t is
not SO. He is now free, and we are
willing for him to be so, and to take
him and do for him what we can
Not like many who preach freedom on
one hand with the Bible, and with the
other holding by the hilt the sword of
determination or colonization. We are
not able to afford such charity if we
would. l have talked with large
number of planters, and the large ma
Jority are in favor of extending to the
negroes every right except suffrage.
Religion, education, labor and pay, all
will be afforded them; homes and com
fort for themselves and families; but
it will take q little time to accomplish
all this. We have to recuperate lit
tie of our lost strength, and the more
readily to do this, we must have la
Dor. Thousands of acres of rich lands
are lying idle for want of it,
/ formerly employed two hundred
able bodied hands. This year have
sixty-three. / offered land to laborers
free of rent, to put up fences and give
them proper tillage. To the laborers
have, | furnish everything, and give
them one-third of the crops of cotton
corn, etc. My calculations are to
make six bales of cotton, with suffi-
cheney of corn to each laborer. IL
they remain, and are faithful, they will
at the end of the year, pocket $500
cash, and have their corn, potatoes
etc, for another year. l have then
bound i'll contract equally binding
on myself as on them. They worl
five DAYS i'll the week-ten hours eacl
day.
If we succeed this year, we will
, know better how to manage hereafter
; for, mind you, this year is an expert
! ment to all of us--I mean, by us
! Southerners. Last year, think, 9
few tried free labor, and did not sue.
, coed. They were mostly Northern
men The freedmen complained great
ly of being swindled by their employ.
ers. But if we succeed or not we can
take few laborers that will work
We are getting rid of our prejudic,
toward Yankees" and if man vii
come here and work, he can easily
make from 81 to SO per day at farm
ing, or in any other employment he
chooses. A good carpenter, or black
smith, anywhere in this country
makes his 81 SO to S. per day Their
let your capitalists go to work, char
, itably, earnestly, and raise funds to
ship off the surplus poor, whom you
say would be glad to leave their pris-
on houses" Instead of spending then
/ money on dead and living heroes, lei
them give it to the lowly and the hum.
BILE poor. Organize societies, or com
panies, to furnish homes to laborers
, Have agencies North, South and West
throughout the land; tell the poor
that there is passage free to home
where they can earn good living and
make themselves home for their old
age and their children. MISSISSIPPI
-Lesiie's Illustrated.