The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1933-03-08

Il USTA think / could stay in hell
l one yeah-effen I thought I
could get out the next" Jim Terry
says. He talks slow, looking at the
stove, his lips shut over his tobacco.
ut shore is hell, and I guess they
not gonna let us out till we makes
our way out by ourselves"
His language is soft, the edges OF
the words are rolled easy like, but
his meaning is hard and clear. I
have come to speak to him about
the Sharecroppers' Union. TITS a
spreadin' like wildfire," he tells me.
Every black man in our county is
for it, even if Sone's scared to say
SO. They's just Waitin' their time"
Carloads of armed deputies are,
at the moment we sit here in this
small room, patrolling the roads
about his cabin and that of his son
and his son-in-laW. The three are
Side-by-side of this on their two
hundrc acre plot in the heart of
the Alabama Black Belt. Jim has
come to Birmingham to get aid
and advice, and to get word to
workers outside the 81 Ided com-
ty. Neither mail nor legrams can
get out. These methods are con-
trolled by the big landowners and
the sheriff. Jim travelled through
the woods at night and caught a
freight train on the fly.
I HAVE come to see him, also at
night. The Negro comrade who
led me brought me through wind
ing alleyways, and we must sepa-
rate 0oing through lighted streets.
Thc is a fear in Birmingham of
whites and blacks getting together,
a fear kept read at moment to
be dashed into a lyme mob. From
the outside of the little shack
which we Apr 'ach, weather
beaten, unpaini d shack looking
like all the others which line the
narrow, "upaved alley, hardly
observable that there is any ha5i-
tation. Cracks, where the light OF
the c'lgle kerosene lamp might
81 through, 90 carefr'ly
biz 'ted.
Tell me, comrade, you own your
ld?"
1t seems like l don't" Jim says,
his broad nostrilS showing only a
tendency tc culver, sis strong fore
head curving back over his shaver
head, and his eyes, small in pro-
portion to his Ter, massive fea-
lures, clear and hard. He is silent
for a moment, and his eyes half
close. He looks away from me at
the dark corner. He holds q cigaret
awkwardly, puffs at it gingerly, fl
nally puts it out and returns TO his
tobacco.
BOUGHT LA
YEARS AGO
He tells me Of how he bought
land years ago, paying off with
crop after crop of cotton, his sons
working and his wife and daugh-
tiers. BY now there are three fami-
lies wi from his small holding:
his, en- wife, two sons of eighteen
and thirteen and a daughter OF
twelve, another sons wife and their
two bali s, and his other daugh-
tiers husband with two small pa
bies.
Now they're trying to take his
land away, But my family amt
gonna be put out ont7 the road"
he tells me. He's emphatic. No
forced collection Of rents or debts
is one of the main slogans Of the
Union. "T told the Of lady I'd go
down fore I'd do it," he says. He
refused to sign away his deed, so
thu niles, several carloads of
them, swooped down upor his place
and took his and his plows.
>sn't home at the time.
II wasn't theah. II I'd been
theah 1 coulda held EN- Off" he
says, and he looks at his boots,
thinking of holding invaders off his
land.
WON'T LET THEM
TAKE FARM AWAY
Boys, 1 wanna keep down con-
fusion" Jim told them before he
left for the city. But I CANT let
'em take my farm away from me.
At least, if go down, my children
gotta have my land to work.
I'm countin' on you to keep my
place safe" he told them. cause
you know that if they make out
heah they gonna put all of us out
the way they do in this country"
do you expect to go back in
there right away?" I ask him. He
is staying out so that they can't
force him to sign any notes nor to
give up his deeds to the land.
81 CANT go back like Christ" he
says. "You know Christ don fight
with no gun-but amt quite that
good" face breaks into broad
smile as he says this and I feel
good and happy to be here with