El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1910-04-09
LABOR IN MEXICO
By Robert II. Murray

pursue him and bring him back 10 the
plantation. not by force, however, but
by coercion. If the peon has sufficient
interest in the matter to make stand
and defy his creditor he cannot be
forced to return to the plantation
No Law for Peonage.
There is no law upon which the
planter can CALL The costs of the pur-
suit are charged up to the runaway, II
he is caught and returned, but there
is no guarantee that he will not slip
away again, and put the planter TO ex-
ira expense. The third course open
for the planter is to proceed under the
civil law and obtain Judgment against
the peon for what the latter owes him
This costs money, and the judgment
is worthless. The peon is worth what
he stands in, his hat, sandals. cotton
shirt and trousers He has no lands
or stock, bonds or jewelry. AT all points
he has his employer at disadvantage
Yet, so strong is the influence of Gus
tom in Mexico, that year after year, the
coffee. rubber, hennequin or sugar
planter, with a crop on his hands and
the necessity of getting it off, will hand
out 10 the improvident and irresponsible
poems millions of pesos in advance
money. Labor is scarce and hard to
come by. Much of it is inferior Plant
ers and labor contractors will bid
against edCn OI0e1 lOT Ii6u, OllCl ms
back and forth sums ranging from
$50 TO 5000 The peon. nine times out
of 10, does not really need the advance
money. Its utility to him is merely
that of means of saturating himself
with liquor, or purchasing gewgaws
for himself or his wife, of which they
stand in about as much need as an au-
tomobile does of a hitching strap.
The Planters PrecautiOn.
y or
taking such precautions as seem to him
to be proper to insure the presence Of
the peon on his plantation until he
has worked out his debt On most
plantations the surveillance to which the
poems are subjected is slight. The
laborers come from a distance. and
the planter places his main reliance
for the security of his contract laborers
upon the difficulties that beset pen
niless fugitive on long tramp through
a densely jungled. thinly populated
country. Besides, it takes a degree Of
s-gumption' to essay a flight, and the
peon has not a suspicion of this NOV
ing and inspiring quality in his make
up
But with the "enganchado" labor diff
ferent tactics are pursued. Generally
speaking. "enganchados" are the Off
scourings of the cities and towns,
the riffraff, who are gathered together
by labor contractors. and shipped in
squads to the tropics, where labor is
urgently needed.
The Labor Contractor.
A planter is unable TO get together
enough men to work his crop. In his
desperation-for planter must be hard
pressed who is willing to take on en-
ganchados-he engages labor contrac-
tor to send him so, 60 or 100 men. The
contractor accepts no responsibility for
quality He gets so much per man.
regardless of the mans efficiency. Any
thing that walks on legs is meat to the
contractor. If he is short few men
ocomplete squad, he will sally forth
to the prisons. pay the fines Of pick
pockets of petty thieves, get their
names on a contract and ship them TO
the plantations.
The planter usually takes no chances
with the enganchado. He is morally
worthless, oftener than not, and he has
not the slightest compunctions about
escaping and beating the planter out
of not only his advance money, but
what it has cost him in contractors
fees and railroad fare So at night
the enganchados are herded into barb
wire enclosures, and guarded. The re-
suit is that most of them, willy nilly,
are compelled to stay on the plantation
until they have worked out the last
centavo Of their debt.
Inefficient Labor.
Enganchado labor is the worst and
least efficient in the country Most
of the enganchados are city men, who
have never had a machete or an agri-
cultural implement in their hands. They
are the veriest greenhorns on a plan
tation. The bulk of them are lazy
Manifestly ii is the interest of the
planter, in dealing not only with the
enganchados, but with the ordinary
peon. to feed them well, and to make
them as contented as possible. A well
fed, contented man is an asset, for he
will work. But if he is starved or ILL
treated, his earning. capacity becomes
lessened. It must be remembered that
all classes of labor in Mexico are as
sets only so long as they can or will
do their tasks.
Selfish consideration alone, in the
absence of any higher or more humane
motive, would impel the planter to ham
die his men so as to get the most labor
possible out of them. For this reason
ii is fair to assume that reported in
stances of poems or enganchados having
been starved or beaten to death bv
brutal masters are exceptional l have
visited plantations where both ordinary
ldOOl-leOnS-dn 6ngancha-
dos, were employed.
On each place there was a white
washed hut, with a barred window.
which served the purposes of a Jail. If
a peon or enganchado refused to work
or made trouble, he was promptly lock-
ed up and fed on limited rations for
day OF two. The jefes politicos keen
sharp eye on the plantations and
upon the labor They are prompt to
investigate and set in motion the ma
chinery OF the law to punish planters
or overseers who maltreat laborers
Holding Contract Laborers-
An American planter-by the wav.
he is one of the very few Americans
who has made a success of agriculture
in the Mexican tropics-told me of a
method devised by him whereby he put
a stop to escapes among his contract
laborers Incidentally. this case illus
lrn4 l.