The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-01-20
THE NEGRO AND THE rMMreRANr.

support them Tn ldleneSS--negr0eS arc l rapidly becoming worthless as farm | laborers in the South. Immigration | seems to be the only cure for the ex- l isting condition. But it will take time
 for this remedy to become effective. | who are available, are in demand. With this state of affairs in exis- tence, agents of the government are at work in the South inducing negroes to
 leave the country. for work on the canal. This should call forth yigor- l ous and earnest protest by the south. Legitimate competition from other sec- l fions would bring no protest rom the 1 South. If any portion of the country can offer more tc labor than is offered 1 here the South bids II go and De pros porous, but this canal business IS not That colored labor here is becoming
 unreliable is beyond question. and, sin- l gular to say. the good crops of the past year had considerable to do with 1t. and 1 that emphasizes one peculiar phase of 1 negro character. As general thing when a white man has some money ahead he wants to save 1t and add to
 it. As an equally general thing If a
 colored man has some extra dollars
 he wants to do nothing till the money
 is gone There are exceptions to both
 rules. of course. but in the main they
 hold good.
 This being the situation the problem with the Southern farmer is to get re- liable labor. At present the large plan ter apparently has choice of three courses: he must let much of his land go uncultivated, or he must divide it up into small farms and sell 1t of, or he must secure white tenants. Re- ferring to the last named alternative, we were speaking some days ago to an
 intelligent gentleman from Southwes-
 tern Georgia who told lis of two cases within his own observation. One was a large land owner who has about
 three thousand acres under cultivation.
 Two years ago he had only two white
 tenants, but now he has fourteen, and
 Is getting others as fast as he can.
 The other man cultivates some two
 thousand acres and he is so thoroughly
 hopeless of any good resu1ts from col
 ored labor that he Is getting them off
 his place as fast he can get white men
 to fill their places. and hopes soon to be
 entirely free from the worry and un- certainty attending dependence on the negro.
 These two instances are typical. but not solitary ones. The time has been when the negro was looked upon as the
 model farm Iaborer in the South, but that time has passed and there seems no prospect that it will ever return. The natural and only remedy is to replace them with white men, and that proposition brings up the sub iect of immigration. It Is becoming . very live and vital question in this section, and is spreading all over the Southern States. So far as the South is concerned, it Is fast becoming both a vital and a national question. Our rich farming lands cannot be allowed to go to waste. and negro labor can- not be depended on; hence, the only hope is by and through the encourage ment and importation of other labor.
 This is why immigration societies are organizing all over the South, and why conventions are being held at which not only the farmers themselves, but Governors and other high State ofi- cials are found working in harmony for a common end and for the common good. This is as it should be. for 1t is a matter that concern all of us, and no one man or one community can settle it. 'In the multitude of coun- sellors there is safety" said Solomon. and only by taking counsel together, by mutual agreement and by working in harmony for the common good can the problem be solved in a way that will be for the best interests of our section and our people, and, incidental ly, for all other portions of the coun- try, for it is not too much to say that all the civilized world is interested in the success Of the farming interests of the South.
 Nor is 1t the farmers alone that are interested. for the same complaint of unreliable negro labor comes from the shops, the mills, the building trades and the households. Owners of the large shops make the same complaint. Contractors and builders add their tes- timony, and housekeepers come for ward with the same reports of unre liable help. The cook and the wash woman are as little to be depended on as are the farm laborers and the me- chanics. The trouble is universal, se- rious and increasing. The negroes re- fuse to work on the farms and the idlers gravitate cityward, with the in- evitable result that all our large cities are fast becoming overcrowded with idle negroes who. because they cannot 1 live in idleness are continually adding | to the already large number of crimi- nals and vagrants.
 That this undesirable class will be increased by the importa- tion of white labor is a certainty. If the negroes will not work on the farms their places will be supplied. and then they will find themselves without | means of subsistence. They will become idle vagrants and the people Twill be | compelled in self-defense to rid them | selves of the presence of a constant | menace. Then the negroes will drift | to the cities and towns and add to the | already undesirable surplus. This will | be still further increased by those who | will be thrown out of employment in the shops and building trades because | they can no longer be relied on. What | will become Of this dangerous and use-