The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1890-04-01
HERE IS A CHANCE FOR THE
BLACK MAN.
The Cotton Planters of the Mississippi
Delta Wants More of Him
Thousands of Acres of
Land Idle.
Waiting for the Negroes Hoe to Tickle "
Into Lie.-TRe Ca Otin@s .
TurNel White
TBY TELEGRAPH TO THE HERALD.

Into Life.-TRe Ca Olin&S
Tmrsel White
TRY TELEGRAPH TO THE HERALD.
NEW ORLEANS, La, March l, 1890.
The fact that the planters OF the
delta cotton belt are exertlng every
means to induce the migration OF one
hundred thousand negroes into this
territory, and have actually given
homes to over thirty thousand within
a year, puts a new face on the race
question. The war cry of the white
planters is constantly heard, owe
want more niggers This state OF
affairs covers a vast country, extend
ing from Cairo to the mouth OF the
Mississippi, and comprising the richest
alluvially deposited cotton lands, most
" uncultivated for want of laborers.
The largest planter in the world is
Mr.. James S. Richardson, out of
whose estates of fifty thousand acres
are twenty thousand devoted to cotton.
Mr.. Richardson stands at the head of
a powerful coterie of planters which
has been instrumental in causing the
recent great migration of negroes.
When sifted it would seem that
there is not and never has been a
scinti!la of politics in these nomadic
tendencies of the negro. The whole
movement has been skilfully engin-
eered by the agents of the Wilson
family of New York, which largely
owns the Louisville, New Orleans and
Texas Railway, and desired to open to
cultivation the rich Mississippi bottom
lands adjoining it, and by Richardson
and his fellow planters, who have had
the choice of these lands.
PROFIT on THE NEGRO.
Persecution of the negro alleged
nor politics have had nj part in it.
The matter was purely a business
speculation by which every negro
secured added exactly $3.50 in cash
each year to the planter who gave
him work.
I called upon Mr.. Richardson for
particulars and asked him if he en-
ployed Senator ingalls, to inaugUrate
race scares by which negroes were
more readily induced to migrate here.
He said: "Anything which scares the
negro from any other section of the
country or will enable the agents to
induce him to leave other States is a
great help to us here. We have taken
over thirty thousand negroes out of
the thin soiled lands of North and
South Carolina, where they lived in
mud huts and had little to eat and
wear. We open to them a land of
plenty, Astounding in watermelons,
'possums, coons, ducks, poultry, bear,
deer and whatever they want to eat.
We give them a whitewashed house
with glass windows, something they
never had before, rent free; also wood,
water and an acre of land. Most of
them have their own COWS, calves,
mares and poultry.
CHANGED THE CAROLINA COMPLEXION.
ave have already made the Caro-.
linas white States and are looking
anxiously elsewhere to discern other
States which do not want the negro.
We will take a hundred thousand of
him at once. Even then we will not
have enough. We a give work to
one hundred negroes where we\have
only one now. The planter to-day is
dependent on the negro because labor
is so scarce. We want an abundance
Of labor to make it dependent on the
planter"
Asked what would be done with so
many negroes Mr.. Richardson said:
Between Cairo and New Orleans
are thousands of square m.Ies of rich
soiled cotton lands covered with for
ests or in the abandoned state in which
they were left after the war. At
present only about ten per cent. or one
hundred and fifty thousand acres, a.
nually are being cleared. The general
improvements, so far as they go, are
first class, and there is not a niger
tramp in the section. 1t will be seer
that we have not la COR enough to clear
lands, to say nothing of working them
after clearing. For clearing we are
somewhat dependent on a few thou
sand corn r~aisers, white men from
Northern Missouri, who come here
during the cold months, clear what
land they car and go home.
al have just paid a bill for the SER
vices of a gang of thirty-fve of these
men amounting to $4, 1000, every
penny of which they took home with
them. This work might all be done
by negroes if we had them and could
spare them for it. They would be
useful as cotton growers and, in the
warm weather, would stay here and
keep their earnings in the State.
THE BLACKS MAXI NO TROUBLE.
"The white labor lives on seventy
five cents per week; the negro on sixtv