The Twin City star., 1913-02-08
The OLD SOUTH SELLING THE new NEGRO
THOUSANDS OF ACRES OF VALUABLE LAND

homIny- anu sarr- meat.. m WIRE 1ncs
his children help him to cult
vate the fields. He uses what com
post he can get for fertilizer, buying
but little Of the commercial product.
His chief expense is for seed and for
ginning If he makes only three bales
az cotton, he has fifteen hundred
pounds Of lint and something over two
tons Of co ton seed. He can get Tor
this seed least $s5, which is low
commercial fertilizer, his crop has not
cost him in money more than 800 at the
most. That is four cents the pound.
It approximates very closely the aver
age cost Of production by. negroes on
their own lands in the south.
When the negro makes. cotton at
four cents the pound and the white
man who hires labor makes It ct nine
cents the pound, there can be no ques-
tion rs TO which must ultimately suc-
cumb. The small white planter sooner
or later either labors in his own fields
city and his lands 20 to the people who
were economically able to make q ly-
ing out of them. Even the white
farmers, who do their own work, find
competition with the negro increasing
ly difficult, and this in spite OF the
Or a careful farmer. II statistics could
truly tell the story they would show
that greater and greater proportion
Of the cotton crop each year is being
more and more OF It on land TO which
he holds title. Even. thirty years ago
the amount Of cotton produced In the
sea islands Of South Carolina by me-
groes for themselves was Insignificant,
vet it is estimated today that at least
half Of the sea island cotton OF South
Carolina, the finest cotton in the world,
10 grown by negroes, partly on rented
land and partly on land OF their own.
The negro owner Of 9 small farm y LIZ IN
where cotton at eight cents the pound
would spell ruin to his white neighbor,
Il means real profit to him: Lands
therefore have more value for him than
for anybody else, and that Is why heis
getting possession Of them.
With the cutting of the pine forests
throughout the south, much land h1ther-
TO waste is being opened for agricul-
tural purposes. It sells for about ten
dollars the acre. Much of it Is being
taken by the negroes. though they pre-.
fer, in general, to buy land which has
been cultivated for years and has been
tested Most Of the cut-over land has to
be thoroughly drained before It can be
profitably used and few negroes have
snough money to undertake this drain.
age. The acquisition, therefore, Of
waste land by the negro Is not now OF
sufficient importance to warrant dag
nosis.
This evolution in land ownership is
necessarily somewhat slow. 1t would
L. fhon IL ia
it not that the negro pays, on the aver
age, double what he ought to pay Tor
every acre of land that he gets. This
is due to his lack of capital and his
longing for ownership, longing 80 in
tense that 1t paralyzes his Judgment.
The influx Of the. negroes into the
towns had beclouded. too, the real
progress that is being made by the
substantial members of the race, whose
contempt for the vicious ones OF their
own color is very great. The negro far
who advance to him at ruinous rates.
They often rob him additionally by a
system Of undergrading, and the white
farmer suffers in this way also. Most
communities drive these fellows out
when they discover them, but the graft
is one very hard to prove. There is
one cotton buyer, bully, who prae-
sically forces negroes In his vicinity to
sell to him, and he persistently under
he Is very likely to do them personal
harm. There used to be more white
men of this type than there are now.
Southern sentiment does not support
them. b
It il beginning to dawn even on the
politicians, usually the densest OF all
persons in their economic views, that
The south can never have any real pros
perity until the negroes have prosper.
needs no emphasis. This prosperity the
negro is rapidly acquiring. and he is
being accorded fairer and fairer treat
nent in business every year. There are
negroes in agricultural communities to-
day more respected by their white
neighbors than many of the whites.
THAT fellow Thorne lent me $3.50
without security when every one OF my y,
.emarked an old aristoerat. who was one
IF the most gallant of the garrison at
Fort Sumter during the war. 81 did
not ask him. He heard was in
trouble and he offered it in such way
that I could not refuse to take it. He
is prosperous and he ought to- be. ]
have known few finer men. white or
black. " A. half-century after freedom
there are thousands Of Thornes. They
are not worrying about election laws.
Their children are being educated and
will be landowners. There Is no quail
dcation for the ballot that they will
not have.
The high mortality among the ne.
groes is not among those who are sub
stantial and own land. It Is the vicious
negro whom disease IS attacking. Di-
versiied farming by the whites, plant.
ing on q large scale by agricultural
corporations, white immigration and
rural districts serve to hold back the
aegro land-ownership movement. The
salient fact, however, 10 this: The ne.
gro is rapidly acquiring choice land in
fmall plots, thereby solving largely. his
own destinv and making Of himself a
desirable citizen. He has already be-
come directly an important factor in
cotton production.
HaRRs0