The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1897-06-23
IN c COTTON MILLS.

| cured IN SuIucleDt NuiNUc'S W op0
rate factory the management is
justi6able in employing negroes, and
| il is no affair of outsiders.
The fear is entertained in some
quarters that the result of the sue
cessful and satisfactory utilization OF
negroes as factory operatives will be
general displacement Of the white
operatives in Southern cotton mills,
and the substitution of negroes, who
may be employed at much lower
rate Of wages than now obtains. The
saving 10 wages to be made by the
subtitution of negro labor will serve
as powerful incentive to mill own
ers for making the change as
soon as it has been thoroughly de-
monstrated, by some years of practi-
cal experience. that the negro opera
tives perform the work required as
skilfnlIy and as regularly as whites.
There is not the least reason to
doubt that ultimately the great abun.
dance of cheap negro labor in the
South will be utilized in the cotton
mills that are being built in such
numbers every year, as we'll as in all
other branches of industry. The
negro is a fixture in the Southern
States; they form the bulk of the
laboring class of this section. and
will continue to do so until long after
majority of the present generation
have passed from the scene Of earthly
activity they are wealth.producers
as we'll as the white people of the
South, and whenever their condition
is improved. aud new fields of labor
are opened to them, fields IN which
there is prospect of steady employ
ment at better wages, we should be
pleased and gratiied, rather than
filed with forebodings of disaster
1t will be the best thing that ever
happened for the cotton manrfactur-
ing interests Of the South, and for
the South as whole, if the negro
can be employed in the cotton mills
satisfactorily and pro6tably. The sue
cess of the experiment will be the
greatest possible stimulus to the more
rapid expansion Of the cotton mill
business in The South, and the next
ten years will witness an industrial
development as great as it will be
beneficial to all classes and condi-
tions of society in the South.
The haunting fear that the white
factory operatives will be the suffer
ers by the utilization of negroes does
not appeal to the writer, for several
reasons, principally, however, be-
cause we are firmly convinced that
long before the negroes come to be in
any wise an important element
among the cotton mill operatives of
the South, there will be demand for
labor sufficiently great to utilize all
of the available supply of both
whites and negroes. The cotton
mill business is but in it's earliest in
fancy in the South, and when it has
attained even q partial development,
more labor will be required than the
South will be able to supply. unless
the negroes are called into service
We have not the least partiality or
fondness for the negro. but we do
recognize and appreciate their value
as laborers in every branch of in
dustry in which We have known
them to be utilized under competent
and iuielligen; direction, and we
have sufficient knowledge Of what
they have done as laborers and as
skilled mechanics to warrant the be-
lief that in cotton mills or in mills cf
other sorts the negro will be found
equal to the requirements conse-
quently we entertain the hope that
the negro will be the reserve upon
which the cotton mills will draw Cor
labor when the supply Of native
white labor is exhausted. for the
negro is far preferable to the igno-
80. a,o-,dod v;cin.,a on,3 ncman