The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1927-06-20
Bitter Sweets for the Negro.

And they to high pacesto become heads OF uni
and to sit in state egsa
tures raves Sunday News in its review of Who's
Coored America which attempts give biography of
the 1S1 Negroes Quoting the author of the bog
raphy the News goes the From the most hum
beginnings many from log cabins and slave parents
these noneer have blazed new trails opened fields of
new hope faith for their and daughters Mean
hundred thousand Negroes being held virtual
prisoners and hae slaves in the inundated OF Mississippi
and Arkansas under the most revolving conditions.
Mr. Walter White in the June % issue of the Nation gives
moving account of the situation his of the flooded
districts In spite Mr. Whites evident effort to be restrained
charitable to those charge Of flood relief the true meaning
appalling situation sares out from between the subdued
lines of his report.
"Army cots for example were given whites first
to Negroes only after the whites had been fully supplied
There instances where the choicest clothing dis
trbuted in the camps and the efovers given Negroes
Particularly the of Mississippi and Arkansas where
these share and tenant farmers are Negroes rare
Negroes obtain fair settlements from their landlords They
live state of virtual and the flood situation has been
used to strengthen their chains.
plantation the flood highly apprehen
e lest they their Negro labor when the flood caused aban
Comment of plantations.
I'm many of the refugee camps Negroes carefully guarded
and when the land dries they released
only to landlord from whose plantation they came
Quoting from the Daily News of Jackson Mississippi in
erview with Underwood who with General Green of the Mis-
sspp National Guard charge of that the report
A labor meanng Negro abor in authorized camps Will be
held not allowed to to other sections the state and after
the danger passed and conditions such that they
they will be taken back to their homes the various
sections of the delta from which they came"
Again according the Vcksburg Evening Post A Thomas
vas instructed release family the
except written consent Of the landlord from whose plantation
aborers the request authorization of
the landlord"
Mr. White further goes say, Negroes in hundreds of
forced work the point of guns the evees long
after certain that the evees would break Conscrpted
Negro labor did practically all of the har and dangerous work in
fighting the flood"
The situation disclosed by Mr. Whites report is to
all workers whether in the shop the farm The fact that
labor the South be concrpted with the aid Of the army
into conditions of virtual slavery establishes
dent dangerous to the entire labor of this country
cry emergency old familiar which has been
used time and again whether during capitalist during
strike to demand abor acceptance of degrading cond
Labor must not permit the determination of its conditions
violent restrictive established employers
with the aid of the government This holds true in Mississippi
as in New York This holds for the Negro it
the white worker The fight against nuncos and in
with strikers is Of the Of the class
struggle the Negroes fight against the yoke The
problem calls for immediate and unified action by the
labor movement and agricultural workers organzations