The Lexington dispatch. [volume] (Lexington, South Carolina) 1870-1917, 1894-05-09
I BASE SLANDER
ON THE PEOPLE OF TIE STATE OF
SOUTH CAROLINA.


SOUTH CAROLINA.
Some of the Northern Papers About
the People OF the south-Nothtng Bul
Lies.
NEW YORK, Nav 5.-When the av.
erage Northerner reads in the papers
that Governor Tillman's political
strength in South Carolina comes
mainly from the farming population
who are Populists, he thinks of the
Populist party in that State as being
composed of such honest, sloN, hard
working, saving, church-going, sidehill
farmers as makes up the strength of
the Republican party in the central
Northern and Western part Of this
State. This is a mistake. The Pal.
metto State countryman bears about
the same resemblance to the farmer of
this region as highWayman does to q
peddler. The horny handed son of toll
as portrayed in the Sunday school
books of a generation back doesn't
exist in South Carolina. The man who
fills his place there is called a cracker.
After you have heard South Carroll
nian say that word "cracker" with the
peculiar intonation invariably given to
it, you will realize that it Is by no
means synonymous with honest far
mer.
A gentleman who has lived in South
Carolina for fifteen years, during which
time he has kept eyes and ears very
wide open, told Sun reporter, few
days ago, some things about the crack
ers, the origin, ways, and the s1gnlh-
caDce of the situation in reference to
them.
cit ought to be generally known, and
I don't think it is," said he, "that the
Populist party in South Carolina does
not include, as it does, am told, in
some States, the good country farming
element. The fact is we haven't enough
of the good farming element to make a
showing on. We have class Of people
who own what we're once farms, but
they don't deserve the name of farm
ers. They're the crackers. There is
something more than ignorance and
uncleanliness, and lax morality in the
real cracker. There's deep-seated dev.
ilisaness, natural love for liquor, and
a g eat aptitude for murder and other
crimes. The cracker hasn't evolved
these things out Of his own inner con-
sciousness; he's come by them honestly
if cracker ever does come by any
thing honestly by neredity. He has a
fine lot of ancestors back of him.
"These ancestors are Of two Kinds.
You Can take your pick there's mighty
little choice between 'em. II you go
back some centuries in your history
YOU will find that at one time the Carib-
bean Sea was 80 infested with pirates
that some of tie countries having an
interest In the New World decided to
clean then out. They cleaned them
out of the sea and drove them North.
The pirates landed and pushed up
through the country, finally settling
down to lives of something rather
worse than usefulness. There Is the
germ of the cracker. or at least, one OF
the germs. Now for the other part.
When the Eoglish settled in South
Carolina they were, in the language OF
today. too strong to work. But the
work had to be done, so they imported
slaves from England-convicts for va
rious crimes, who were to serve out
their terms as slaves on the plantations.
Some died in the process; Others served
out, became free, and having nothing
to do, settled. There's your other germ.
Unite the two, and you have the crack.
er in his first stage.
"HoW and where he lived for some
generations thereafter isn't clear-or
why, for that matter. But, be did live,
probably by hunting and doing odd jobs
and he became known as poor white
trash Even the niggers looked down
on the poor whites and up to the time
of the war he was the most despiSed in.
dividual in the country, aud the most
worthless. The blood OF the pirate and
the criminal was still there, unmixed
with any better strain, for none but
poor white would marry with poor
white. But it was weakened and
thinned by laziness and 1naction and
drink and lack of opportunity. Then
came the war, and a change for the
poor white. No longer having slaves to
work their farms and plantations for
them, the Bourbons, as the good fami-
lies were called, drifted away from their
country places to the towns. They
could not soil their hands with spade or
plough, and as their only other resort
they went into business. Mark the re
suit. The farms fell into the hands of
the poor whites, being first divided up
into small portions.
There you have your Door white be.
coming a land owner. You might sup
pose that he would develop honesty and
thrift and ambition to improve his op-
portunities to become decent citizen.
He doesn't. The pirate and criminal
strain is in him, emasculated By gene
rations OF contempt and degradation,
but still there, and now it begins to
show itself. Your cracker makes his
wife and children work the farm while
he hunts or fishes at such times as he
isn'C too lazy. When he gets money he
goes for moonshIne whiskey and gets
1t. Why, the North Carolina moon
sinners run their blockade wagons for
the crackers. That's where they sell
their moonshine, and they run the gov
ernment blockade and Tillman's block
ade to do it. And when the cracker
gets full Of Whiskey he isn't poor white
49, -