The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1910-07-05

roll on. For the negro IS not tHs
strong, healthy man tina he was
| Drunkenness, cocaine, dissipation anc
immortality are at work. and WheI
they begin to work the negro quits
He is more susceptible to yellow fever
than he was; an enormous percentage
far more than fifty per cent-are
infected with revolving diseases II
forty years his tuberculosis death rate
instead Of being below that Of the
white man, has become three and one
half times as great. All of these
| causes render him less efficient "a &
laborer.
1.-The most discouraging develop
ment is the fact hat he is NOR
susceptible to malaria than the white
man-and malaria is much more fata
now to the than to the white
THE proportion Of unsllilled labor
ers is one-fourth greater in Northern
communities today than it was in a
typical Southern town fifteen years
before the war. Comparing rree
negro with free negro, there were just
nine times as many negro mechanics
IN Charleston forty-four years age
as there are today in sis
/ New York cities. Comparing again
free negro with free negro, there are
almost four times as great a proper
ton Of unskilled laborers in New York
as there were in Charleston at the
Civil War.
'This shows either a decided tend
ency to shirk the skilled trades, which
require long and tedious apprentice
ship, or that labor conditions in New
York State are such hat the negro
has no chance.
1.-THE situation in the South today is
not different from that revealed by
, the New York State figures. The
| young Southern negro is also unWill-
,~~ 30 40 I;~orolf dawn 70 n ra-ioI nf
hard and steady labor. In the south
he has an absolutely equal chance with
the white boy, gets the same pay for
the same hours, no OppOSl-
ton, yet the negro apprentice is as
rare as orang rov in Alaska.
THE negro does not work like the
white mar works. In the cities there
require one dollar per week, VIII work
one day per week at one dollar, then
take a banjo and loaf around the bar
Der shop for the other six days. His
woman cooks for a White family and
totes vittles. h pays the house
rent. feeds him, and his dollar a week
supplies the pocket change. If wages
were twenty-five cents per day, he
| would probably work four days Al
two dollars, he would probably put in
a half day. He makes UP a large pro-
portion OF the city negro-and makes
all the trouble. The hard working
and Industrious negro-of whom
there are many, such as pOrterS, dray-
G janitors and the like-rarely give
trouble and rarely meet It; they do not
make the problem in the South.
The plantation negro always looks
Onward to moving next ear, II he
| we're to stay too long on one place,
Colonel might think / belongs to him
Ta ASSERTS his freedom nv rambling
If he makes too much money in a
year, he will not remain on the planta-
ton where he has been prosperous.
The moment he gets hold OF a few
dollars his harbaric restlessneSs seizes
him. He catches the travel itch and
moves.
1.-THE negro who fails. who comes
out in debt at the end Of the year,
wants to move. He won't begin+another
ear with the same landlord owing a
held-over a%ccOun Success and fail
Lre reach the same by diff
ferent routes. The negro who stays
upon a place year in and year out is
generally the one who neither sue
ceeds nor fails. but simply drags
along.
"What would become of the labor
ing man in New York, Chicago, on a
New England farm, or an Arizona
1dl1tI, A. dSCId6Co OAiJ ~ o6SS
work in a year? What would a Kansas
farmer do with a hired man who
'oafed 200 working days a year? What
would become Of the prosperity of
Illinois and Iowa If the tenant farm
ers in these States were voluntarily
idle tWo-thirds OF the time?
Yet these negroes made money,
far more than any other laborers on
earth, an astonishing amount, when
he quantity and quality of their
work is considered. Out of 100 fam
lilies on a certain plantation, more than
rs families cleared from $500 to
$500 a ear after paying all living ex-
penses. They lived. had everything
they needed, and at the end OF the
ear had that much money in cash
due them from the planter. Yet,
bear In mind, these negroes averaged
only 112 days work in the year.
sHTuo claccas Of mio<ioporiee ,ro