Read to Your Neighbor.
CHAIN-GANG CATECHISM.
[The " Chain-Gang Catechism," including the frontispiece, has been issued
and circulated by the Independent Democratic Committee of Georgia in the
interest of Hon. T. M. Norwood, late United States Senator and at present
their candidate for Governor, and is a Democratic arraignment of a Demo¬
cratic administration, showing the most infamous practices that have ever
obtained under a convict code in this or any other land. Gen. Gordon,
referred to below, recently resigned his seat in the United States Senate,
and Gov. Joseph E. Brown is his successor. Colquitt is a candidate for
re-election on the regular Democratic ticket.—Ed.]
Ques. "Who are the owners of the chain-gangs of Georgia ?—Ans. Gov. Joseph E.
Brown, Gen. Gordon, and ALFRED H. COLQUITT; the latter, according to public
rumor and private account, owning several shares.
Q. Whom do these gentlemen favor for Governor of the State?—Ans. Alfred H. Col¬
quitt.
Q. What does 'the law require of the principal keeper of the penitentiary ?—Ans. That
lie should inspect each camp monthly, and see that the humanitarian principles o ? tap
law are carried out.
Q. Does he do so ?—Ans. He does not. See report of Col. Alston, chairman of 0 »in-
mittee on, Penitentiary, made Tuesday, December 10, 1878.
Q. Why does the law require monthly inspections?—Ans. To prevent escape to
prevent cruelty, to prevent hard and illegal punishment, and to prevent the muri >f
men who were taking the opportunities of escape.
Q. What was the result?—Ans. The next Governor of Georgia, Hon. T. M. NO
WOOD, in his speech at Atlanta, quoted the facts from the report to the Legislature,
and which is as follows :
" There shall be such regulations, restrictions, and arrangements made by the Gov¬
ernor, to be enforced by him, as will associate only persons convicted of crimes of moral
turpitude, which shall regard the condition of the sexes and age of convicts and ability
to labor." The committee say : " We are compelled to state that this part of the law k
not < served. WE FIND IN SOME OF THE CAMPS MEN AND WOMEN CHAINED
TOO THEE, AND OCCUPYING THE SAME SLEEPING-BUNKS. The result is that
there ' > now in the penitentiary twenty-five bastard children, ranging from three months
to five $ 3ars of age, and many of the women are now far advanced in pregnancy. This
we regard as a flagrant wrong."
Q. T uis true ?—Ans. Yes; twenty-five illegitimate children, born of mothers lying
chflii A promiscuously in bunks or on the ground among the male convicts, are to-day
fc -ig reared in these horrible convict camps. i
Q. Is Gov. Colquitt aware of these facts ?—Ans. Certainly so. How can it be other¬
wise ? His attention haB been pointedly directed to them repeatedly through the North¬
ern and Southern press.
Q. Is it in his power to correct these evils, and improve the condition of things in
this respect ?—Ans. It certainly is.
Q. Then why does he not do so?—Ans. Because he and his personal friends, Gep.
Gordon, J. E. Brown etal., are directly interested in the perpetuation of the horrible
system.
Q. Is there on record a single sentence ever uttered by Gov. Colquitt in condemnation
of these barbaric cruelties and scandalous proceedings?—Ans. Not one, so far as
known.
Q. What other evidence is there going to show Gov. Colquitt's hearty sympathy and
accord with the democrats of the South ?—Ans. There is now in the State an institution
called the State Agricultural Society, sustained mainly by appropriations from the treas¬
ury. When this Society met in Athens, in 1876, Col. McKinley delivered a speech. A
deliberate plau was laid out in it to establish a landed aristocracy, and to keep all the
lands in the South under the control of the white men, and not permit it to be sold to
colored people, as it was proposed to keep them in the capacity of tenants for all future
time. This Society passed a vote of thanks to Col. McKinley and ordered the speer1
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published in their proceedings. The presiding officer of that Society was Gov. Alfred
H. Colquitt, and he circulated this document. A convention met in Atlanta in 1870.
Gen. Colquitt presided over it, and in his speech he congratulated the people upon their
FORBEARANCE UNDER GREAT WRONG.
Q. What was this "wrong?"—Ans. That the laws of the United States tiad given the
black men the same rights as the white men.
Q. Is it not trug that these convicts, chained together by dozens in the fields and on
the public works, have been worked and whipped until they dropped dead in their
tracks ?—Ans. Strictly so.
Q. Is it not true that convicts endeavoring to free themselves from this barbarism by
escape are hunted down with blood-hounds ?—Ans. Yes; and it is also true that when
so hunted down and driven into swamps for safety, they have been cruelly and brutally
shot to death, because they refused to come out into the jaws of these ferocious beasts,
urged on by their inhuman pursuers, which stood at the water's edge ready to devour
them.
Q. Has Gov. Colquitt, during his four years of service, ever publicly expressed his
disapproval of these cruelties, or taken steps to prevent their repetition?—Aus. Never :
although the law not only empowered him to act, but made it his bounAen duty to do so.
Q. What does ex-Gov. Smith, Gov. Colquitt's immediate predecessor, say of the chain-
gang system ?—Ans. He says it is a standing disgrace to the State, and au insult to the
virtue, intelligence, and civilization of her citizens.
Q. What does Mr. Norwood say of it?—Ans. He says publicly : "You have heard of
the horrors of tlie midships in the old slave-trade. You have read of the dead and dying,
and of the dying making their cold pillows of the corpses of the dead. You have read
of the " Wanderer" which came to these shores in 1859, on which mortality was so great
that the corpses thrown overboard would almost make milestones along her track across
the deep ; but I say to you that there were no greater horrors in these scenes than are
read of in the lamented Alston's report, or to be told by eye-witnesses of what has trans¬
pired in these convict camps." And yet colored men are being asked to endorse with
thsir ballots the chief instrument of these horrifying scenes, and the very man who, hav¬
ing it in his power, utterly failed to do anything to alleviate the terrible sufferings of
J Uese unfortunate victims of chain-gang barbarity.
Q. What is Gov. Colquitt now doing to improve the condition of the colored people ?—
Ans. He has recently pardoned two notorious white murderers of defenceless colored
men, while the poor colored convicts who are serving life-sentences for stealing one
mackerel and similar offences are still in chains !
Q. Has Gov. Colquitt ever publicly denounced the brutal and inhuman proceedings
which resulted in sentencing to this horrible chain-gang for life the poor, penniless ne¬
gro, Asa Gunn, upon a confession extorted by blood-hounds, and in the presence of a
gallows, a grave, and a coffin, prepared by those who were pecuniarily interested in his
conviction ?—Ans. No, never.
Q. Why not?—Ans. Because, if he was so disposed, he did not have the moral courage
to brave public opinion for justice and humanity's sake, in defence of a helpless member
of the oppressed race, whose votes are now so eagerly sought by him for his vindica¬
tion^?)
Q. Previous to his present candidacy has Gov. Colquitt ever offered any re wards or
taken any active steps to secure the apprehension and conviction of masked desperadoes
who have whipped, beaten, outraged, and killed helpless and defenceless negroes, male
and female alike ?—Ans. Hardly ever.
Q. Why not ?—Ans. Because he and Gen. Gordon, according to the latter's sworn tes¬
timony before the Ku-Klux Committee of Congress, were both members and ring-leaders
of the Ku-Klux Klaus in Georgia.
Q. Is Gov. Colquitt exerting himself to secure the conviction of "Night Eiders,"
who outraged the family of poor Joe Thompson, a colored ciitizen living near Jonesboro',
and murdered _his daughter and son ?—Ans. He is not.
Q. Has he ever taken any decided steps looking to enlarging and improving the facil¬
ities for the education of the colored people ?—Ans. Nq; he has given more attention to
congratulating them upon their own efforts to improve their moral condition than to
either the improvement of their intellects or the infamous chain-gang system.
Q. Has Gov. Colquitt ever made any effort to prevent election frauds or suppress Ku-
Klux outrages in the State ?—Ans. No.
Q. What does the lease law further require?—Ans. " That the lessees shall not use as
guards any of the convicts, or place them in any places of trust or control over the con¬
victs;" and yet the same report shows this provision is violated, and that Gov. Colquitt
knows it. The Atlanta Constitution, months ago, reported that Edward Cox, convicted
of killing Col. Alston^ (the convicts' friend,) is kept at Joe Brown's coal mine checking
cars, while the poor white and black men, who have no influential friends, are working
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hard, three hundred feet below the ground, and never see daylight. Cox, before he was
convicted, worked a part of the convicts on Flint river, as partner of Gen. Gordon,
Q. Do these convicts compete with free labor ?—Ans. Yes. They are mining, making
bricks, cutting timber, and working farms. But for this, free labor would be employed;
but free labor cannot compete with convict labor, for Joe Brown, Gordon, and Colquitt
only pay about $12.00 a year for a hand, or five cents a day apiece.
Q. But what can be done with convicts ?—Ans. Put them in the walls of a peniten¬
tiary, place men over them who have no interest in their labor, and they will be treated
fairly and hu>nanely.
Q. Do you know of any abuses?—Ans. Yes, plenty of them ; but it will take too long'
to tell them all. The poor man who tries to escape is run down by blood-hounds, his
jflesh torn, and he frequently killed. Those who have influential friends are allowed to
do light work, acting as guards or clerks to the owners. A white man named ltatteree,
convicted in Atlanta and sent to the penitentiary, was made a brakesman on the Canton
Narrow Gauge railroad. He ordered an old colored man, Dau Paine, of Woodstock,
Ga., who was a passenger, to get off and help put on wood. The old man said he was
a passenger ajjd had paid his fare, and did not want to load ,wood. ltatteree (a convict)
jumped on him and cut him badly. Remember, this outrage was committed by a convict
who, because of his influence, was made a brakesman instead of working liko other con¬
victs, and yet Gov. Colquitt has not taken any notice of it, although Gov. Smith reported
the fact to him. The old man is suing the railroad, and his case is in the hands of Winn
& Sons, lawyers, Marietta, Ga. Write to them, if this statement is not believed. Aft-:"
a rich man is convicted, he clerks a little while for the lessees, and is then pardoned bv
Gov. COLQUITT.
Q. What about these street chain-gangs?—Ans. They are little better than the peni¬
tentiary gangs. If a respectable man goes to a city, and happens to get a little oif
is fined ten or twenty dollars, and if ha can't pay the fine ie is put in shackles and w
to work on the public streets, mortifying him and his family.
Head what Col. Bob Alston (the convicts' friend) says in his report to the Legislate - •
" The average escapes at all the camps, including those killed in attempting to esca;i. .
owing to insufficient guards, have bsen from twenty to forty-five per cent. Hence it t
that there are now upwards of five hundred and twenty-three escaped convicts roaming
at large, being nearly one-half of the present number now confined, who have escaped
since the lease system went into operation. The law provides a penalty of two hundred
dollars for every negligent escape, unless the convict is recaptured and returned to work
within sixty days. Although there are now at large over five hundred, not one dollar
has been recovered to the State."
YvThy? Because Gov. COLQUIT is the friend of Joe Brown and other lessees, and re¬
port says also a partner in the lease. .
And again Col. Alston says :
" In Mr. A. S. Barnwell's camp, the average mortality for three years has been sixteen
(16) per cent, per annum. This is a fearful death-rate, and, -Whether caused by the loca¬
tion of the camps or the cruelty of the overseers, calls for immediate remedy. The
startling character of these figures will be appreciated when it is considered that the re-
jDorts from nearly all the prisons in the United States (and your committee have had
them before them) only show an average mortality of one per cent."
THE CONVICT LAWS OF MISSISSIPPI.
[Extract from "Home Rule in the Solid 'South.,,~\
The penal laws of Mississippi furnish another instructive picture of the beauties of
"Home Rule."
The acts of 1878 (page 1G9) provide that "whenever any person shall be sentenced to
the penitentiary of this State, it shall be the duty of the circiiit clerk of the eourt passing
such sentence to cerfify to the superintendent of the penitentiary the cost, if any, of the
prosecution due by the prisoner. It shall be the duty of the superintendent to keep him
in custody after the expiration of the time for which he was sentenced, and to work, or
cause him to be worked, at the rate of twenty-five cents a day, not including Sunday,
until said fine and costs are paid."
The law of lK7l> (page 51) defines what shall be considered penitentiary offences, and
after dedlarli*g thafVvery theft above ten dollars shall constitute grand larceny, adds
this pro-taio : " P/iw< 7«i, That it shall be considered grand larceny to steal a hog, pig,
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shoat, cow, calf, yearling, steer, sheep, lamb, goat, or kid of the value of one dollar or
more."
The punishment is not exceeding five years in the penitentiary, -with the costs of
prosecution added.
The attention of the writer was recently called to a case in Pontotoc County, prose¬
cuted under this ''proviso." Horace Wilder (colored) was sent to the penitentiary for
eighteen months for stealing a pig valued at $1.50. He had just finished his term of
service, and the superintendent asked for the costs of prosecution. The circuit clerk cer¬
tified the amount to be the enormous sum of $74.85—the net expense of prosecuting a
colored lad for stealing a pig worth a dollar and a half. At twenty-five cents a day, he
will be required to work three hundred days more, or within thirteen working days of a
year.
But after committing the colored men for these petty crimes, they make brutes of
them before they are released. The contract system prevails in Mississippi, and nearly
all the colored convicts are sub-let to planters in the Mississippi bottom. There they
are worked with ball and chain under the old slave-driver, armed this time, not with a
bull-whip, but with a double-barrel shot-gun, ready to shoot them down on the first in¬
timation of an effort to escape. At night they are huddled together in a log stockade,
dark, close, and foul with stench and vermin. Their nights, their Sundays, and their
days of sickness are spent in these "black holes " of wretchedness and filth, and thus,
stinted in food, poorly clothed, worked from early dawn till dark in heavy fetters, and
continually under the most degrading and debasing influences, they serve out their terms,
nod. at last, disgraced by their confinement, utterly debased in nature, disfranchised,
L M and hopeless, they are turned loose upon the community fitted to become
iminals of tne highest grade.
But see another picture. J3y the laws of 1878 it is mad® the duty of. the county
pervisors, or commissioner, to make a contract with a responsible person to take and
r, p the county prisoners free of expense to the county. It is the stockade, the ball
,nd chain, and the shot-gun over again. They call them government farms. "Any
person convicted of a misdemeanor before a justice of the peace, if his fine and costs are
not instantly paid or secured to be paid within sixty days, shall be committed to the
county contractor to work out the fine and costs at the. rate of twenty-five cents a day.
.But if sick, said convict shall work two days for every one lost by sickness, o&e of which
days shall be for compensation for keeping him during a day on which he was sick "—
punished for the providence of God, and for being the victim of this accursed system.
But this is the law for " convicts." Now, what is the law for persons who happen to
fall into the clutches of the civil magistrates, and are committed for want of bail ? Sec¬
tion 5 of the law above quoted provides: " That in any county in 'which there shall be a
contractor for keeping prisoners, if any person committed to the jail for an offence that
is bailable shall not consent to be committed to the safe keeping and custody of the said
contractor, and to work for the same under the provisions of this act, such prisoner
shall be entitled to receive from the common jailor, as diet for each day, only six ounces
of bacon, or ten ounces of beef and one pound of bread, and wetter. * * * And if
3aid prisoner be afterward convicted he shall nevertheless work under said contractor a
sufficient term to pay all costs of prosecution, including the regular jail fees for keeping
and feeding him during his entire confinement."
This, of course, is to be done at the rate of twenty-five cents a day, with the sick days
doubled, and the bill of charges will be in keeping with the needs of the hungry crowd
of jailor and attendants.
Then, again, the trial-courts are held only every six months. The prisoner may be
arrested on some trumped-up charge immediately after court adjourns, and cannot give
satisfactory bail because the "ring" want his labor on the govexnment farm. He is
committed, and soon starved into their service. Six months pass and the case is not
ready for trial, and he goes over to the next term, meantime having made a crop of cot¬
ton worth at least six hundred dollars. He is then arraigned, and most likely not a wit¬
ness will appear against him, or he establishes his entire innocence of the charge ; but
after what experience in the hands of the law ? Twelve months in the vile stockade;
twelve months with ball and chain; twelve months under the surveillance of the shot¬
gun ; twelve months of barbarous servitude; twelve months of labor robbed and family
starved—and this is Mississippi justice !
The picture is not overdrawn. Not unfrequently eighteen months or two years elapse
before trivial cases are finally tried and disposed of. The county stockades are to-day
full of untried innocent men, while eleven hundred colored convicts, on small offences
and long terms, are rotting in the stockades of the penitentiary.
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The Infamous Alabama Law.
The legislature of Alabama have refined on the Mississippi plan so far as to add to' the
provision making the stealing of any kind of domestic animal grand larceny, without
regard to its value, a half dozen roasting-ears, or a pound of cotton. The following
is from acts of 1874-'75, p. 2G0, "An act to amend section 8706 of the Revised Code:
"Any person who steals any horse, mare, gelding, colt, filly, mule, jack, jenny, cow,
or animal of the cow kind, hog, sheep, goat, or any part of any outstanding crop of
corn or cotton, and any personal property other than that hereinbefore enumerated ex¬
ceeding twenty-five dollars in value, is guilty of grand larceny, and must, on conviction,
fee imprisoned in the penitentiary, or sentenced to hard labor for the county, for not less
than two nor more than five years."
By the application of the landlord lien law, referred to hereafter, this provision can be
enforced against a man who takes a mess of roasting-ears of his own raising, before he
has paid the landlord all claims for rent and advances.
The Texas Practice.
An emigrant from Texas to Kansas testified before the Exodus Committee as follows
in regard to some of the causes of the desire of the colored people to leave the former
State :
" A colored woman was arrested (in Matagorda county) and the judge hired her out at
a quarter of a cent a day."—"Q. To workout how much of a fine? A. I think, thirty
dollars."
" They call these people county convicts. I know some of these men who have convicts
that they hire, and they are under the supervision of a sergeant with a gun and nigger-
hounds. * * * They hire them and put them in the same gang, with the striped
suits on, and, if they want, the guard can bring them down with his shot-gun."
(pp. 414, 415.)
Peonage in the South.
A system of liens on the crops for rent, food, and supplies has been devised which
keeps the colored men in debt, and compels them to sacrifice their crops to the landlord
for whatever he chooses to allow.
No matter how good an opportunity he may have to sell part of his crop, the tenant
cannot sell a bushel of corn or a roast pig until the landlord is paid, without making
himself liable to some of the special laws against him noted in the preceding chapter.
He has to turn the crop over to the landlord altogether, and trust to his generosity for a
remnant for his family.
The South Cakolina Law.
The landlord has a lien on one-third of the crop of the renter for rent, without any
contract, and may take a lien and all by contract. (Acts S. C., 1878, p. 411, sees. 5 and 6.)
The colored tenant having been stripped by the liens of one year has not food and
supplies ahead for the next, and must sign a contract giving his landlord centrol of all
or starve.
The Georgia Law—Landlord Takes All Without the Formality of a Contract.
By the Eevised Statutes of 1873 (page 346) landlords have a lien on the crop, and also
all other property of the tenant, for rent. By contract, landlords or storekeepers have a
lien on the crops and all a man's property—on all articles of any kind furnished. The
act, approved February 25, 1875, provides that "the liens of landlords shall arise by
operation of law from the relation of landlord and tenant." (Laws of Georgia, 187S,
page 20.)
The tendency of these laws is to keep the poor colored people, who are dependent
upon the land-owners for supplies, to raise a crop in a state of constant peonage. This
is one of the most common reasons assigned for the exodus by those seeking homes in
the North. While they do the work, the landlord takes the crop.
The foregoing are fair samples of the tenant laws in all the Southern States. As the
Conservatives became assured that their control of the legislature was permanent they
regularly eliminated all the just and merciful features of the laws, until they have reached
their present tyrannical form and made universal the barbarous practices which are mak¬
ing the States, nominally free, really slave.
Under the operation of the law the most outrageous extortions are practised on the
colored people. They are charged an annual rental of from five to ten dollars an acre—
often more than the land itself would bring if sold in fee-simple. They are charged
double for brj^A^wn, meal, &c., that the same may be had for from the storekeeper,
who would" V fhem a fair price for their produce. But with the landlord's lien
covering ^ey can neither sell nor buy except at his pleasure and to his
profit.