The National tribune., 1903-07-09
Free Medical Advice Coupon. !
PEONAGE IN THE SOUTH.
Reign of a New Form of Slavery More OBJ
noxious Than the Old.

The recent decisions by United States
Judges Emory Speer and Il. q. Jones,
both Southern born and bred, and both
Democrats, against the institution of peon-
age in the South have startled the country
as to the existence of this system. Inc
word is new to most ears and all South
erners will be startled to learn that they
have a thing with such a name in their
midst, though they are all perfectly aware
of the thing itself Peonage comes from
a Portuguese word meaning one who
travels on foot. 1t next came to mean 4
it was applied to substantially all the
lower classes, especially those in Spanish
American countries. These, while not
slaves, were held to service by practice
which virtually amounted to slavery; that
is, they made a contract for service in re-
turn for which they were to receive food,
clothing and shelter, and the master who
supplied these managed to keep them in
constant Indebtedness, while the law COM
PEELED them to serve him until they had
discharged that Indebtedness. Nearly all
the laborng class of Mexico is now, and
always has been, in Il state of peonage,
and the same is true of most of the same
class in other Spanish American coun-
tries.
The Southern States, with their drastic
debt laws and their summary capiaSeS
for bringing back any debtor who at
tempted to leave the country, have always
had the poor whites in as much peOnage
as the planters and wealthy men cared to
maintain. Before the war, any poor white
whose services were of any value to any
body had much difficulty in leaving the
country, because there was generally q
way to keep him.
After the negroes were freed this sys-
tenn was extended to them. 1t is true
that the negroes gave much excuse for the
enactment of these laws, because a large
proportion of them had little idea of the
honor of debts or contracts, and they were
constantly prone to abandon the planta-
tiOns at the most critical period for the
crops, to go elsewhere where higher wages
were promised them. or for no other rea-
son than just desire for a change. The
result was the passage by the Legislatures
of laws intended to compel the negroes to
fulfil their contracts and to pay their
debts.
These laws were IN themselves quite
strenuous, according to Northern ideas,
and their application by the poor white
trash who were the overseers in slavery
days and still held the same position on
the large plantations, made them as severe
as anything which had existed before the
Emancipation Proclamation.
1t was legaliZed slavery, without any of
the ameliorating features of the old slave
system, since the men are treated precise
ly as working stock, from whom the most
labor must be gotten within specified
time, after which there is no care or con-
sideration for them. Negroes could not
leave the plantation on which they were
employed and go to work elsewhere, they
could not board a railroad train without
permission, they could not decide for them
selves whether they were too sick to work
or not, and offenses were punished as in
the old time by the lash or the buggy
trace, which seems to have been favorite
instrument of discipline on the Alabama
and Georgia plantations.
1t is useless to say that the negro him
self was not responsible for much of this
1t can not be otherwise than that the mass
Of the negroes are still shiftless and i'm,
provident, that they allow themselves to
be gotten into debt for all manner of use.
less things, and before one debt is dis
charged the negro contracts another, and
so produces all the conditions of peon-
age.
Very few Of them can read or write, OF
have any idea Of business conditions, and
they are ready to be taken advantage of
their labor at as near nothing as possible.