The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1903-08-26
GEGRGIA'S NEW VAGRANT Law.
Just Such One Is Badly Needed in
South Carolina.

and especially where great industrial
enterprises are in progress, there is
much inconvenience and to some ex-
tent great deal Of suffering, because
of the scarcity Of labor on which the
people rely. Farmers, as the Augusta
Chronicle says, look in vain for labor
ers, though about street corners in
towns, cheap rum shops and railway
stations negro loafers-are congregated
in large numbers. They have too
easy a time in town, living by their
wits or on the charity of negro cooks
and house servants" largely we may
add, obtained from the larders of the
households in which these are i'm
ployed. and no persuasion can induce
them to so to work on the farms
where they are needed.
The prevalence If this form Of
vagrancy, an Incentive to idleness and
leading directly to various forms of
crime, has caused the Georgia legisla-
ture, to consider a new method OF
treating the question OF negro labor.
and it is meeting with much favor
in other parts Of the South than
Georgia. The bill gives a clear and
easily understood definition of vag
rancy, and empowers police and other
like 2oticials to give to any officer
authority to issue a criminal warrant
for the arrest of all vagrants OF. per-
sons suspected of being vagrants,
with a view of their trial. The bill
defines vagrancy, against which it's
provisions are directed, as follows:
Persons wandering or stroliing
about in idleness, who are able to
work and have no property to sup
port them.
Persons leading an idle, immoral
life, who have no proerty to support
them, and who are able to work and
do not work.
"All persons able to work, having
no property to support them, and who
have no visible or known means Of a
fair, honest and reputable livelihood.
The terms 'visable and known means
OF fair, honest, and reputable liveli-
hood as used in this section, shall
be construed reasonably continuous
employment at some lawful occupa-
tion for reasonable compensation, or
fixed and regular income from proper
ty or other Investment, the income
from which is sufficient for the sup
port and maintenance Of such vag-
rant.
Persons havinga fixed abode, who
have no visible property to support
them, and who live by stealing or by
trading or baptering stolen property.
Professional gamblers living ia
idleness.
AL able bodied persons who are
found begging fora living or who quit
their houses and leave their wives and
children without means OF subsist-
ence.
"All persons able to work and who
do not work, but hire out their minor
children and live on their wages"
This is the most interesting leg
islation of the kind that has ever been
attempted OF course it is directed
against negoes as class. Even the
Georgia crackers" work after their
way, but the negroes are largely given
up to vagrancy as set forth in this
bill. AS remedy it is urged that
European immigration be diverted to
southern ports and fields, but this
would be very difficult to accomplish.
Only d tritling percentage Of European
immigrants 60 to the south in the
hope Of employment. 1t is a fact,
whether as regards northern or Euro
pean labor, that it keeps clear Of COM
petition with negro labor. The south
wants the negroes, but it wants them
to work. The negroes Of the south,
as the Atlanta Constitution contends,
must ''be made to understand that
shiftlessness and unreliability in labor
employment" no longer to be toler.
ated, will bring sure suffering to them;
and it recognizes that Booker Wash
ington is helping laudably to that
end by intoxicating "a reform of negro
philosophy" or the philosophy of win
uing white respect by working to de-.
serve it.