The Lexington dispatch. [volume] (Lexington, South Carolina) 1870-1917, 1898-12-14
THE LIEN LAW.

The LIEN LAW.
The opponents of the lienlaw have
already opened their batteries upon
it and have raised their annual clamor
for its repeal. This law, like every
other law upon the statute books, has
it's friends and its enemies; its good
and evil side and its uses and abuses.
In continuing it in full force and
eject We should consider whether
the law works the greatest good to
the greatest number, or it is hav-
ing the reverse effect. The intention
of the law is very good and in. the
main its application is a help to many
8 poor man who has large family
dependant upon his daily labor for
the bread and meat they eat to sus
tain life and for the clothing they
wear, who would otherwise be un-
able to procure the food and raiment
necessary for the sustenance of life
and the comfort of the body unless
it be to mortgage their little home,
which stands as a shelter between
them and actual suffering. The lier
law is the poor mans basis of credit
which enables him to pitch, work and
gather his crop, and, without it, he
would be deprived of the means Of
getting the supplies necessary to
make his crop. By it's assistance be
is enabled to pull through the dull
summer months comparatively free
from the harassing thought of where
withall shall we be clothed and fed,
BY reason of this condition he is bet
ter able TO prosecute his work with
more vim and energy, and as rule,
better and larger crops are the result.
1t is purely matter of business,
based upon business principles and
must be dealt with in business like
way. When q poor man applies to
the merchant for advances, the first
question asked is what property have
you to hypothecate to secure me in
the event of your failure to'pay me
at the time specified? Have you any
land, or money, or any kind of secu-
rity that I can seize and convert into
cash to liquidate your Indebtedness.
IF the answer be no, the chances are
that the poor fellow will go away
disappointed at having failed to Sc
cure the help in which he stands so
much in need. Under the lien law
system he can answer I have none of
this worlds goods which I can pledge
as legal security, but lam going to
plant so many acres 'in cotton, so
many in corn, so many in potatoes,
and so on, and I will give you lien
on my crops, and nine chances out of
ten, if the applicant be honest and
industrious, he will get all the ad-
vances he needs. It is a matter of
business in which supplies is the one
consideration and dollars and cents
the other, and the merchant does
not run as much risk to lose his &C.
count as he would under a plain
credit system, in which the honesty
of the debtor is the only security the
creditor has.
It is true that it sometimes hap,
pen that the idle and shiftless takes
advantage of the law with the cold
and deliberate determination to cheat
and defraud the accommodating and
conGding merchant, and obtain ad-
vances with no idea of ever paying
for the same, and this is one Of the
evils of the law. But, in cases of
this kind, it will doubtless be found,
if the matter were sifted to the bot
tom, that the merchant alone is to
blame for his losses from failure to
use the commonest and plainest bust
ness precautions and through his own
carelessness and negligence, and be
has to find fault with something so be
blames the lien law. Hence this is
not a sufficient reason for the repeal
of the law. The law has for num-
Der of years been il practical opera
ton and in the main it has given
general satisfaction to the merchant
and farmer alike. Wisdom, it seems
to US, suggests the propriety Of leav-
ing we'll enough alone, by leaving the
law just as it is, for it is possible
that to repeal it we may jump from
the pot into the fire and adopt
another system more pernicious than
the one we now have.