Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1870-04-20

lconduct on an occasion so trying
He has accepted his liberty with 8
self-possession a decorum and facili
ty that some of the most cultivated
and polite nations might envy in an
emergency where such good fortune
had been imposed upon them. The
promise which he has given in con-
q duet so wise and moderate 1 believe
he is now fulfilling by his steady I'M
proyement in his new condition and
that, too, i'm the face of difficulties
which have put his capacities of de-
veloping himself to the severest test.
In short, the negro in the South is full
filling the expectations of his friends:
surprising those who, wishing him
well, had yet pitifully distrusted him
in his new career; and giving thevery
best answers to his detractors in those
quiet proofs of progress which make
but little noise of self-assertion, but
against which no misrepresentation
no matter how violent and persistent,
can prevail.
SThere are some large, appreciable
facts in the condition of the negro in
the South which go to check the too
common habit of the newspapers to
make improved, reckless assertions
concerning him. They afford some
light on a subject which covers an ex-
tensive ground, which has but few
statistical guides, and on which q
speculative class of writers, taking
advantage of the supposed absence of
any facts capable of proof, have i'm
agined that they might impose al
most anything upon the credulity of
the public. Thus have been repeat
edly told in a loose way that the ne
gro in the South will not work, that
he is hopelessly lazy, that his idea of
freedom is to live without labor, &c.
This is common charge against the
negro; it is easily made in general
terms, but happily the assertion may
be brought under the dominion of
some general facts which go to test
its truth, and to show that prejudice
and exaggeration have dictated this
reproach.
There is some fiippancy about this
reproach which has at last become
tiresome. Nor are the sources from
which il commonly comes very high
/ ly recommended to us for the quali-
! ties of censorship. There are, regret,
I yet dare to say, many thousands of
/ lazy white persons in the South, loaf
I ing on street corners and drinking
whisky, perpetually talking of ZEN
I terprisen coming down South-as if
said enterprise was something to be
/ brought to them in box and opened
/ in their midst-the day Virginia is
admitted into the Union, or some
| other event happens, who are exceed
ingly apt to declaim on the laziness
of the "cussed niggers." Now 1 do
not believe that the negro is, or ever
will be, q model of industry. His
temperament is tropical. But / do
say that Notwithstanding his disad-
vantages of nature and all other dis |
advantages land they are many the
negro has shown since his emancipa- |
ton an industry that is extraordinary;
that is constantly, daily increasing,
both in volume and discipline; that
has enabled him to build churchesand |
found charitable institutions of his /
own; that has kept him better clothed |
than he was in his former condition;
and that exhibits its results to-day in |
the vast bulk of the agricultural pro-
ducts of the South.
There are two facts which furnish |
n curious comentary on the reproach /
that the negro is deficient in industry /
or that he has declined in this respect /
since his release from his former con-
dition:
l. How can we account for the fact /
that there has been no considerable 1
falling off in the volume of produc-
ton in the South on the contrary,
an increase under many heads-on the
supPosition that the negro has de-
creased in industry ?-for it must be
admitted that accessions of labor. in
the South from abroad-that is, other
than the negrO-have been wholly in
considerable. Again, another COM
mon detraction of the negro land one
made, curiOusly enough, by the very
same writers who have reproaehed
him for indulence) is, that he is dying
out, that his numbers have been fear
fully diminished by mortality Incl
dent to his emancipation; and so these
theorist, anxious 10 degrade the negro
on every possible plea, are plunged
into the Inconsistency that, if his
race is really the victim of such fear
full mortality, then the industry which
it has shown in yet keeping Gp the
average of Southern production is one ;
that deserves wonderful acknowledge ,
ment and praise. The fact is, both of :
these hypOtheses-that of the decline
Of the negro in industry and that of q,
his disappearance through death and !
1isease-are false, and an example of d.
-hese inconsistencies and absurdities !
INTO which men fall who are anxious
rom incomplete observation or from !;
he haste of prejudice, to construct !
,heories, without attention to the great :
lcts which underlie the details and !
init the area of speculation. =
The second significant fact which q
wish to bring before the readers is the d
for the first time in the n
history of the Southern negro, of a s
considerable migratory movement s
Within recent months there has been il
movement of the negroes by tens of n
thousands from Virginia to other fields Ii
f labor, and the indications are of n
olumn of emigrations from the lands r,
where the cereals are cultivated and a
where wages are low, pushed down ri
ntO the "black belt, extending from f.
he Sea Islands of South Carolina to r,
he trans-Mississippi borders of LOusi- h
ma. The movement is one of vast n
importance, and does not h
ppear yet TO have drawn sufficient rf
from what few thoughtful ii
len remain among the legislatures Al
nd publicist of Virginia. But 1 pro- is
Ose TO regard it here only in the in
ngle aspect of striking, vivid proof HI
the negro's desire for work, which m
as enabled him to overcome what is vi
the strongest Characters az
cs of his race-an attachment to To- ti
Il associations; and as an indication IN
SO Ofa moral enterprise wholly in su
)nsistent with the theory of his ten M
ency to barbarism. Wemay, at least, m
.e now that the negro is not content m
starve or TO rot wherever fortune has m
laced him; emigration such as he has in
is an incident of civiliZa- DIR
on; it has required calculation and w,
strength of purpose which barbara We
Is could scarcely be expected to have. 10
+ twenty thousand Virginia negroes M
leave their scanty and narrow 70,
)mes, going out not as mere adven- tir
rers and vagabonds, but as cheerful DIR
I'd organized hands of laborers. do
The difficulty, as have observed it
the South, is not so mach that the 90,
.groes will not work, as that they co,
e not very ready or very cheerful TO diI
1rk where they think their wages tat
her insufficient or precarious. And WI
must be admitted that there are an,
me grounds of complaint in this re- res
eet. The wages of farm hands in vol
rginia are eight to ten dollars a "a,