New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1879-04-02
JUST LIKE WHITE FOLKS.

JUST LIKE WHITE FOLKS
A striking array of evidence is presented
on another page respecting the exodus of the
negroes from the South to the West. Our St.
Louis correspondence describes The destitutiOn
and misery of the two thousand blacks who
recently arrived at that city in half
hopeless prlgrimage toward a better
land somewhere, they hardly knew where.
Congressman Phillips, who in part rep
resents the State toward which most
of these people turned, because the
name of Kansas was associated in their minds
with freedom and progress, discusses the
causes of this movement. Our Washington
correspondence sets forth the causes them
selves in the words of prOperty-owner in
Mississippi. VINO declares his reluctant con-
clusion that the State els surely, and not
slowly, drifting into a condition of an
"archy."
One of these negro emigrants from the Lower
Mississippi told StLouis reporter the other day
that he understood colOred people were treated
lust like white folks IN Kansas, and that
this was why he and his companions
wanted to go there. In a single SEN
tence the poor negro revealed the motive
that undcrlies this remarkable migration
"a migration which shows a spirit of
enterprise III the blacks not dreamed of
before by those best acquainted with them,
and which cOntradictS one of the strongest
impulses in their nature-the love Of home.
Among the two or three thousand emigrants
who have landed in It. LOUIS and Kansas
City during the past three weeks probably
there are not twenty who were ever fifty
miles away from their birthplaces before.
The negro has intense local attachments.
He occasionally moves from one plantation
to another to get better terms for work
ing the land, but he rarely goes OF
his own vohtion far away from the nelghbOr-
hood where he was reared. 1t is plainly no
ordinary discomfort that has caused thrOngs
of people 10 leave the scenes dear to them
from old associations and seek new homes i'll
a distant State. They have evidently grown
weary of waiting for the "year of jubilee"
for which they have prayed so fervently i'll
their little rude churches in the woods. The
"goOd time coming" seems, alas, just as far
off as ever. They want to be treated
like white folks, but they do not
sec that any progress is being made
in that direction. They work hard, but
the white people seem to get the profit of
their labor just as in the days of slavery,
leaving to them barely enough to support
life. They have nominally the rights of
citizens, but if they attempt to elect any
body to Office they incur the wrath Of the
whites and run the risk of cruel prosecutions
from organized bands of bulldOzeTs. If they
assemble to discuss their grievances they are
accused of malicious designs and are
lucky if they escape an attack from the
nearest rife-club. Any retaliation for gross
outrages, or even resistance for self-protection,
causes the whites to raise the hue and cry of
"ngger Instruction." and they are shot
down like Wild beasts, or hunted to the
swamps and canebrakes.
The ST. Louis papers have obtained from many
of the emIgrants statements in their own
language of the causes which led them to
forsake their old homes. These statements
as well as those made in our own correspond
cnce, amply confirm the view taken bv The
TRIBUNE in q recent article. The difficulty
of making living under the system
of renting lands for fixed amount of
cotton per acre is the first cause
mentioned by all these people for the
discomfort which led to the emigration
movement; and the second and evidently the
stronger one, for they dwell on it more. is the
sense of wrongs suffered at the hands Of the
whites and of hopeessness of any better order
of things in the future. On the Mississippi
bottoms i'll the vicinity of Vicksburg and
Natchez, the region from which nearly
all the emigrants come, the planters
charge rental for their lands in lint cot
ton equivalent to $40 an acre. This is
an exOrbitant figure, for the cash value
of the lands is rarely over $50 an acre, and
in many localities is not as much as $15
But this is not the only disadvantage the
negro tenant contends with He pays a heavy
price to the landlord for having his cotton
gnned and he is usually compelled by his
necessities to buy his provisions of the land
lord on credit and pay nearly double their
cash value. AT the end of a year of hard
work he often finds himself not only
without anything to show for his toll
but in debt for the bacon his family
have eaten and the clothing they have
worn out. The credit system, which is
the curse of the South, bears hardest upon the
negro farmer. ANY attempt to secure better