The Economic Aspects of the Negro Problem.

CHAPTER IV.

THE PERIOD OF NEGRO SUPREMACY.

LL ARGUMENTS in favor of granting the negro any degree of participation in the political life of the nation, are met by the typical southerner, socialists often not excluded, by pointing at the period of reconstruction; that is claimed to be the dreadful example, which has for all times settled the problem of negro franchise in the negative. And it must at unce be admitted, that the period of reconstruction represents quite a dark page in the history of American selfgovernment. To be frank, the instantaneous grant of that supreme power of political life, without the slightest preparatory stage, to several millions of slaves of but yesterday, was a very daring undertaking. As one northern writer remarked as early as 1865, "to say, that men just emerged from slavery are qualified for the exercise of political power, is to make the strongest pro-slavery argument I ever heard. It is to pay the highest compliment to the institution of slavery."

vote.

There were two additional factors which served to aggravate the situation. On one hand the great majority of the white southerners were for the time being deprived of their right to On the other, the stream of adventurers from the north, who felt a chance for a good catch in the dirty waters of the Southern political situation, introduced an entirely new element which even Schurtz did not calculate on. Of course, these new comers were all republicans: politicians, office holders, ex-army men, and disreputable characters in general, all those carpetbaggers, who have attached their name to this interesting though distressing period of American history.

The degree of negro domination varied in different states. The length of the period varied as well. though in general it began with the granting of the franchise to the negroes and ended with the recall of the northern troops from the south in 1876.

Formally, it was a period of negro domination. Not only did the negroes refrain from electing their old masters, as Carl Schurtz feared they might do, but they systematically voted for negro candidates for offices. Thus in 1873, for instance, there

were in the State legislature of South Carolina 94 negroes as against 30 white men. In the State of Mississippi there were in the same year 55 negroes and 60 white men, of whom a great many were carpet baggers and in alliance with the negroes.

The same condition of affairs prevailed in almost all southern states. It was natural for these legislatures to nominate negroes officials for all positions open to them. The selection of negroes was not limited to the local legislative assemblies. Very soon there appeared negro judges, negro lieutenant governors, (though there was no case of a selection of a negro governor) members of congress, and even United States Sentators.

Most of these negro statesmen had been slaves up to two or three years before their political career began, and were not overburdened with education. "A goodly number were unable”, says Garner, the author of a very painstaking investigation of reconstruction in Mississippi, "to write and were compelled to attach their signatures to the legislative pay-rolls in the form of a mark", There were illiterate sheriffs, judges, even

senators.

state

The appearance of a southern legislative assembly during that period was not very attractive from the point of view of any white man, and of a southern white man in particular. "Yesterday," writes a contemporaneous southern investigator of the problem, "the assembled wisdom of the state.... issued forth from the State House. About three quarters of the crowd belonged to the African race. They were of every hue, from the light octoroon to the deep black. They were such a looking body of men as might pour out of a market house or a court house at random in any southern state. Every negro type and physiognomy was here to be seen, from the genteel serving man to the rough hewn customer from the rice or cotton field. Their dress was as varied as their countenaces.. There was the second-hand black frock coat, glossy and threadbare. There was the stove pipe hat of many ironings and departed styles. There was also to be seen a total disregard of the proporieties of custom in the coarse and dirty garments of the field, the stub jackets and slouch hats of soiling labor. In some instances rough woolen comforters embraced the neck and hid the absence of linen. Heavy brogans and short torn trousers it was impossible to hide."

To appreciate fully the nature of the change which had taken place it must be remembered that notwithstanding its adherence to the democratic party, the south before the war was very much opposed to any democratic principles. The south was an aristocracy, almost an oligarchy, into which every society based upon slavery must eventually develop. The pride of the planter was deeply wounded at the sight of the negro, the slave of yesterday, whom so recently he could severely chastise, and abuse

in any way he saw fit,-in the position of the master of the political machine. What have we come to? and What will become of us? Those were the questions which the southern planter asked himself, and to which he could find no answer.

The behaviour of these legislators disgusted the old southern aristocrat no less than their appearance. The èx-slave was anxious to show his independence the best way he knew how. He spat to his right and to his left, chewed tobacco during the sessions, put his large feet on his desk in the official chamber, laughed aloud, cracked jokes as well as peanuts, and enjoyed his newly acquired freedom and political influence as best he could.

All this was very hard to bear. But still more serious were the actual results of the legislative work of these black legislators, which struck at the pockets of the impoverished planter, a more sensitive place even than his pride.

It is not so easy as it might seem to obtain an unprejudiced picture of there results. The majority of the contemporaneous writers, as well as of the subsequent investigators were southerners with great prejudices against the negroes, and the results of mismanagement under negro domination are frequently greatly exaggerated. While some forty years have passed since these events, the animus has by far not yet died out. And even technically, the efforts to follow the details of local government or fifteen states present a great many difficulties. It may be stated with a reasonable degree of accuracy, that the years of negru domination had a deciedly detrimental influence upon the financial condition of the southern states. The negro legislators and administrators, who had almost no property of their own, had no moral scruples against increasing the taxes upon the land property of their old masters. The rapidity with which the negroes have learned all tricks of the white man's corrupt politics should go a long way to prove the racial equality of the negro as far as mental qualities are concerned. They voted themselves extravagant salaries, they increased the salaries of all the oficials, who were mostly negroes. Negro sheriffs frequently earned as much. as 15-20 thousand dollars a year. On the other hand the childlike character of the new legislators often showed itself in ridiculous extravangances in appropriating money for decoration of the assembly or committee roomms. On the desk of every member of the Mississippi legislature there appeared each morning five daily papers, though the majority of the legislators were unable to read or write, and the bill for newspapers for one year loomed up to $3,670. In the same state the colored lieutenant governor paid the expenses of his household by draft upon the state funds. In the state of South Carolina the printing bill for one year reached the enormous sum of $600,000; and about half a million dollars were expended for the refurnishing of the

assembly. Perhaps the record for curious forms of extravagance is held by the same State, whose negro legislators ordered the purchase of 200 french China spittoons at $8 a piece for the use of the 124 members of the legislative assembly.

Where was the money, forthcoming for such extravagance? Though direct taxation upon property was increased in all the southern states, in some of them as much as ten or fifteen times, nevertheless the South was too much impoverished by the destructive war to be able to raise all this necessary and unnecessary money by taxation alone. The sum of state, county and municipal taxes often reached as much as five per cent of the valuation of the property, yet the income from taxation did not cover even one half of the total expenses of the carpet baggers government. Loans soon became necessary, and in the realization of these even greater corruption was practised. The financial ventures were of so complicated a nature that the ignorant negroes, or the majority of them, were utterly unable to understand them, and so they were acting entirely under orders of the white men.

or

The indebtedness of South Carolina in 1861 was $5,400,000; by 1872, it had increased to $29,000,000. This gigantic sum, for a poverty stricken state, was not all spent upon furniture salaries. The white leaders of the ignorant black folks soon evolved various schemes much more ambitious. They started with various schemes for construction, which always were the mainstay of the big boodler, while the small fry may be satisfied with signing for a petty sum on a fraudulent pay roll. The impoverished southern state governments liberally subsidized railroads, guaranteed the bonds of private railroad companies, and for such consideration towards the railroads the legislators received handsome compensation, the greater portion of which surely, reached the white man's pocket; to say nothing of the white railroad man and the white New York banker, to whom went the lion's share of the spoils. In this process of grafting the interests of the black man were as brutally sacrificed as those of the white man. Thus the legislature of South Carolina had appropriated $700,000 for purchase of land for distribution. among the negroes. Under this law land was bought which was absolutely unfit for agricultural purposes, and frequently paid for at ten or twenty times its market value.

South Carolina was no exception among the southern states. In Alabama the state debt increased from eight to 25 million dollars. In North Carolina the valuation of taxable property decreased from $292,000,000 in 1860 to $130,000,0000. in 1870: nevertheless the sum of taxes levied increased from $540,000 to $1,160,000. In addition $14,000,000 worth of railroads bonds were issued, and an issue of $11,000,000 was authorized, but not a mile of railroads was built with that money. Georgia owned

a railroad which it cost less than a million dollars to run, and which brought a net income of about $400,000 per annum. With the establishment of the carpet bag regime the operating expenses of the road jumped to over two million dollars, while the income turned into a deficit. In a very interesting work on the carpet bag regime in Georgia, written by a negro state senator of that period, the author admits the facts of extreme corruption, though giving them quite a different interpretation.

Such a policy spelled ruin for the south. Moreover the evils were not only financial. The entire government of each state was soon in the hands of a political machine which was not at all adverse to a systematic falsification of election returns, and so felt itself securely entrenched in power, and perfectly safe from the influences of public opinion.

Such, says the southerner, were the results of giving the negro the right to participate in the political life of the country. On the face of it, this deduction permits of no criticism or contradiction. Post hoc, ergo utque hoc. And the negro legislator was the most conspicuous and most irritating factor in the situation.

How far then may this period of reconstruction serve as an argument against the enfranchisement in the present or even in the future? How far do the facts quoted prove or disprove the inherent unfitness of the negro for political life? That is a grave problem which will be considered presently. But viewing the situation from a purely impersonal and scientific point of view, one must agree, that besides the incapacity of the negro, whether organic and eternal or acquired and temporary, there were many other important factors in the situation.

negroes

To begin with, an actual majority in the hands of the was to be found only in the states of Mississippi, South Carolina, perhaps Louisiana, while the sad facts of reconstruction and corruption were universal throughout the south.

Secondly, of all fruits of corruption, only the smaller crumbs such as high per diem salaries, or expensive spittoons, fell into the hands of the negro legislators. The plums that were really worth anything, such as profits on bond issues, subsidies, loans, franchises, and so forth, remained in the hands of the few white politicians. These were the representatives of the nobler race who came down south right after the conclusion of peace, in order to work for their own pocket all the time. At the same time the majority of the white men of the south were deprived. of their right to vote. The new arrivals from the north became republicans, as a matter of course, because the republican party had the protection of the federal troops which had remained in the south. The presence of these troops was necessary for the protection of the negro population, the commanders of these