Little Falls transcript., 1885-01-23
SOUTHERN CONVICT SYSTEMS,

SOUTHERN CONVICT SYSTEMS
How the Convicts Are Worked and Treated
A Field for tho Criminal
Laws Made Only for Negroes.
s'The Shooting of Penitentiary Con-
victs," was the heading of dispatch
in a newspaper which read on last
Friday, and which gave the details Of
the shooting of three hired convicts,
who were at work in the Coal creek
mines in East Tennessee, writes an
Indianapolis correspondent of The Gin
cin1ati Enquirer. To-day I read an
other paragraph which stated that the
convicts in Arkansas are hired out to
farmers at So per month. Within the
past ten years, and often during that
time, I have had opportunities to see
every phrase Of the system of leasing
convict labor in various states, but
have given special attention to those
states which allow the convicts to be
worked out OF doors. What shall
write on this subject will be unvar-
nished facts, and l will try to make
them so distinct that no one can dis
pute one statement which I will make.
The states which | know lease their
convict labor to be worked outside of
the penitentiaries are Arkansas, Tex
as, Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, and
Kentucky. Most of the states lease
their prison labor, but in the north the
convicts are worked within the prison
walls; the tasks are regulated by the
state, through its own officers; the
state feeds the convicts, treats them
when sick, attend to their sanitary
condition, has them bathed and their
clothing properly washed and mended.
I shall not make comparisons, they
are unnecessary, for the intelligent
reader can do that when he has the
facts. I only want to call atten-
tion at the outset to the fact that the
constitutions of all the states, follow
ing the eighth amendment to the
national constitution, provide that
"excessive bail shall not be required.
nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel
and unusual punishmcnts inflicted.
Itmay be that / do not know what
constitutes ''cruel and unusual pun
ishments," so that those who read the
facts will have to be their own judges.
During the years 1875, 1876, and
1877 the convicts of the state of Ar
kansas were leased to Mr.. Zeb Ward,
of Kentucky, MIR. Ward had been a
prison-labor contractor in Tennessee
when first knew him. His lease of
the penitentiary of Arkansas and of
the. convicts was for the term of ten
years. One of the conditions of the
lease was that Mr.. Ward should not be
hampered with the presence Of ward
en- or any state officer who could stand
between the cupidity or passionate
cruelty of the lessee. During the term
for which the persons were sentenced
the state had no control whatever over
the criminals. The contractor fed,
clothed, and cared for them as he saw
fit. About 1875, perhaps 1876, Mr..
Ward found that he could not work
all the convicts in and about the peni-
tentiary, so he opened a large cotton
plantation and penal farm up the Ar
Kansas river, and in what is known as
the river bottoms. There the soil is
very rich, but the malaria is general,
and if not fatal, produced the result
which was fatal in the end. visited
this prison farm twice during the sum-
mer of 1877, once at the invitation of
Mr.. Ward, and once at the request of
citizens of the little town on the Little
Rock and Fort Smith railroad. Dur
ing my first visit I saw that the con-
victs were fed on corn-bread and fat
meat; that they were huddeled to-
gether in the vilcst, tilthjest dens of
cabins within q stockade; that they
were not half clothed, and no regard
was paid to their sanitary condition;
and, worse, that there were no bathing
facilities within the blockade. There
was not white prisoner among the
three hundred then on this prison
farm, and l do not think there was
white man in the pen;tentiary at Lit
tie Rock who was subject to the con-
tractor. Several white men, who in
gentlemanly bouts had killed other
white men, and who feared lynching
or assassination if kept in the jails Of
the counties where the crimes were
committed, were confined on their own
request in the penitentiary until the
courts could go through the form of
releasing them. They, of course, were
not convicts, and when they felt like it
came down town and had good time
with the special guards who looked
after them. It seemed to me that the
criminal laws applied only to negroes
except where the crime was horse
stealing. This observation applied to
all the states, in general way, where
convicts were leased OCT to c trac-
lars, and it appeared to me ~...t the
arrest of negro for any offence
seemed accepted as proof positive
that he WAS guilty. I gave especial
attention to this subject, and no.
ticed that conviction almost al
ways followed arrest. I do not
know that the negro is always a thief;
perhaps he is, which would account
for his almost universal conviction
when charged with crime. The
treatment of leased convicts has been
discussed through the newspapers,
and in Kentucky and in Georgia have
heard of legislative Investigations, but
| am not aware that any legislation
has ever followed which was intended
to mitigate OF change the methods of
treatment to which the victims were
subject. once talked to Mr. Ward OH
this subject, and he told me some Of
the methods by which be controlled
refractory convicts. IN one case
man refused to leave bis cell to work
in brickyard. Mr.. Ward went to
the blacksmith shop and had two long
iron hooks made, which were heated
red-hot, and then taking two guards,
who covered the man with shot-guns.
he told the man to come out in one
minute or he would have him dragget