St. Landry democrat., 1883-05-19
The Homestead Exemption.
tCapitolian-Adv0cate.1

Louisiana is the only State in the
Union, bidding for the immigration OF
farmers, which has no law consecrating
the home to,the family by the homestead
exemption. We say no law, because we
are speaking of a law in practical
sense, which is operative as real pro-
lection for the family. The Constitu-
ton of 1879 and the Supreme Court have
so whitfield away the provision inserted
in our laws in 1856, that it may as well
be said that there is no homestead ex-
emption i'll our State at all.
Very different has been the temper OF
all the progressive Commonwealth OF
the West. In every pamphlet they
send abroad to attract settlers to their
vacant lands they insert in capital let
ter the laws which assure to the family
the possession of their home in spite OF
all the vicissitudes of fortune. The
State of Texas caught the suggestion,
homesteads in her fundamental law,
which secures the home to the wife and
children and establishes a bulwark
against the improvidence of the hus-
band and father.
There has, however, been a certain par
ty in Louisiana which has been always
deafa tos agricultural distress and
has been fanatically attached to
the Draconian justice of Shylock. 1t
was going to create credit by putting
iron cables around the neck of the
farming class. 1t was going to estab-
lish new era of commercial honesty by
giving ample verge to usury. 1t was
going to regulate labor by binding it
neck and heels and turning it over to
capital, not only buckea, but gagged,
so that it might not even murmur its
discomfort.
We see the result. There is no such
thing as a general credit among the
agricultural classes. The farmer is,
"lowanced," in the old parlance Of the
plantation, and he goes to work in the
spring with a rope around his neck in
the shape of lien. Vast areas have
been eaten up by mortgages, and where
there used to be homes of industrious
yeomen we now see rack-rented hold
ings, their lean sides scraped off year
by year by negro tenants, while the for
mer owners have taken refuge in des-
pair in Texas. When the immigrant
comes he is invited to a howell, and to
rations of pork and corn meal, doled
ont under a lien, at 100 per cent. advance
over cash prices. Nor is the merchant
to blame for this, for the system is
lottery. Big profits are realized when
crops are good. If the crops fail, all
hands go to work to adjust balances,
and there is a scuffle for the miserable
remnants, which are generally scooped
up by big cost bill.
Such is the system which the inexor-
able spirit of our legislation has pre-
pared, ard more wretched system was
never devised by that low species of sell
fshness, that goes by the name of
and craft. There is no
agricultural prosperity which is the ne
cessary basis of general prosperity.
Texas and Arkansas are being flooded
with population while Louisiana has the
go-by.
The farmers cannot explain why
these things are so. They complain of
and misgovernment. when the
tax rate is lower than in other States,
where the people are exulting in hope
and prosperity.
1t is the system. Until the system is
it is vain to hope for substan-
tial prosperity, either in country or in
town.