The Raise of Sharecropping or Peonage - Research Paper

Introduction

In the 18th century, slavery was one of the most prevalent institutions in the United States of America. Slave trade in its more economic form had naturally spread following the establishment of settlements in Virginia. The demand for cheap labor in the southern states plantations made slavery more vibrant with the Confederate states fighting for the expansion of the wicked institution in the western parts of America. However, humanitarians led by President Abraham Lincoln retaliated by consolidating the Union against the wish of the Confederate states, which resulted in the eruption of the bloody Civil War in 1961. By this time, the American government had taken stout measures to abolish slavery including the enactment of the Emancipation Proclamation Act of 1863. Following the 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution in 1865 slavery was abolished throughout America and among Indian tribes. The turn of the event seemed new dawn for slaves who had been fighting for their freedom for years. Unfortunately, the former slave-holding states began enacting a series of labor laws targeting the freed slaves, which led to the creation of a new system of involuntary labor known as peonage or sharecropping. Peonage spread as large plantation owners, reintroduced servitude on the basis of alleged debts or indebtedness contrary to the expectation of initially freed slaves who were eager to start independent lives. Plantation owners, law enforcers, and government officials at this time all overlook the peonage practices believing it was moral simply because it was deemed legal.

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From Abolishment of Slavery to Sharecropping

After the end of the Civil War in 1865, the reconstruction era came about with Union troops occupying former Confederate states to ensure that African Americans and other minority groups in America had an equal right with Americans. In fact, this period saw a rise in a number of African American politicians on the local state and national politics. However, the new strides being taken did not address all the economic, social and political problems that have emerged as a result of the Civil War. For instance, after the war, the entire southern region of the United States had been engulfed in economic troubles as labor became scarce and costly for plantation owners. Likewise, the banking systems in the region had collapsed and the Confederate currency had lost its value. The landowners, farmers, and planters also could not borrow money from federal banks to pay for labor offered by a few of the freedmen. The situation worsened since the southern states heavily relied on farming put their farm produce had deteriorated making it difficult for them to secure loans. Consequently, to resolves this crisis the Congress established the Freedman's Bureau to aid former slaves and refugees as well as to handle abandoned land.

The freedmen needed land they could settle and support their families. Immediately after being set free from slavery, the former slaves started practicing subsistence farming on land that had previously been abandoned by the Union army. However, after President Andrew Johnson, a former slave owner, and a Democrat, rose to power, he restored the Union army land back to its former owners. Freed slaves were left without land or any source of income obliging them to depend on new landowners and the South planters, which promoted sharecropping. Instead of land being cultivated in gangs and under the supervision of overseers, sharecropping encouraged landowners to divide their plantations into small plots that would be cultivated by a single family. In exchange for land, the freed families would farm but give half of the crop to the landlords. Likewise, the landlords began to charge high-interest rates on goods bought from them on credit turning to sharecrop into a poverty and economic dependency system. In fact, those working in the farms were lured into signing contracts that made them subject to their masters, just like during earlier slavery.

Sharecropping in Different Regions in the United States

Sharecropping in Georgia

The southern states and landowners manipulated the politics revolving sharecropping for their own food making their wicked acts justifiable. For instance, under the statute of South Carolina which was acknowledged as constitutional law, any farm laborer working under a contract and had received advances in form of money or goods had to honor the agreement with his or her creditor or be imprisoned. According to a narrative by a Georgia African American sharecropper on forced labor, the narrator was tricked with favors from the landowner, the Senator, who would later lure him to signing a ten-year contract with him. During this period, the wife of the sharecropper had to work as a house servant in the premises of the landowner serving his family members without any of them raising alarm. Later, the Senator built convict camp with forty masculine African Americans from Georgia who had been leased for about $200 each being forced to work for the Senator as slaves. In fact, to make it worse the Senator was provided with security guards and physicians to look after the slaves by the state, which is an indication of government involvement in sharecropping bondage.

Additionally, according to the narrator, following the establishment of Senator Convicts' Camp, the free laborers decided to hold a meeting hoping they would free themselves from mistreatment from their master. However, after consulting some Americans they learned that they were all under a ten-year contract and failure to honor it would result in imprisonment or being held like other prisoners on the farm. The landowners had the courts, the weapons, as well as the transport and communication facilities all aligned for their own benefit with African Americans having to comply with the law protecting the plantation holders. The women who had been convicted were also used as a mistress by the white despite being married to the sharecroppers. All the malpractices that were taking place for example in Georgia or South Carolina were known to the state government and American people but they did not bother to take action as they believed the constitution protected landowners from judicial intervention.

Sharecropping in Virginia

According to an interview conducted by Historian Carlie Hardy, Minnie Whitney suggests that in the last three decades of the nineteenth century the advent of sharecropping system in the southern region resulted to unease interaction between African Americans farming families and American landowners. Whitney indicates that sharecroppers especially those from Virginia where she was brought up were determined in freeing themselves from American bondage. However, the farm owners also used all means to retain sharecroppers. Consequently, the landlords and farmers often conflicted but at long last, the sharecroppers would suffer most from such confrontations. For instance, sharecroppers were mistreated and paid low wages of about 5 dollars annually as a way of making them rely on American landlords for a living. Likewise, those that traveled far from Maryland would get enlightened and wished to spread the information they would receive far from the farms to their colleagues. However, they were obliged to remain silent as such acts would result in ill-treatment to their family members. Therefore, according to Americans farmers, sharecroppers were to remain in dark and serve them without questioning their acts even when oppressed or intimidated.

As compared to slavery or the lives of convicted workers, sharecropping would be thought to have been fairly as sharecroppers had the freedom to move around and were not severely punished for simple mistakes. Nevertheless, as time passed by American landlords started using legal mechanisms to ensure they had control over the largely African American workforce that toiled in their farms. In fact, the whites believed that freed slaves would only work effectively in the plantations under supervision. According to an interview with Hughsey Childes, Hardy discovered that slaves had a hard time reading and writing and even this was the same case with their children. The illiteracy levels of African Americans worked in favor of landlords who used to lure sharecroppers to sign contracts without understanding what they were committing themselves into for about ten years. Likewise, the whites interpreted the law of the land in their favor including those in the judicial services leaving freed slaves without any source of protection.

Sharecropping in South Carolina

According to Hughsey, the mistreatment went on until it became a common occurrence in the southern states. For instance, in South Carolina, one of the sharecroppers seemed to have mastered a way of saving whereby he would hold back some cotton after harvesting. After compiling six bales of cotton he took four of them to the market and together with his landlord they visited a bank to clear his debts from the sales. At this instance, the landlord received his payment and acknowledged that he had cleared the farmer until the start of a new season. When the same farmer took the remaining two bales to the market the landlord learned about it and claimed he had been cheated. Despite having cleared the sharecropper, he took the matter in his hand and hitched the farmer to his horse as if he was a wagon. The sharecroppers were drugged in the street of Abbeville South Carolina and hanged in the park. Everyone remained silent, including sharecroppers in the farm as they were not allowed to say anything about it and the government did not offer them any form of protection.

Sharecropping in Mississippi

Similarly in Mississippi sharecropping developed to be the way of life after the Civil War. The Freed African Americans and small-scale landowners were left vulnerable to large-scale plantation proprietors as the Mississippi economy continued to deteriorate. By 1900, 85 percent of black farmers did not own the land they were cultivating. Majority of farmers were trapped in the crop-lien system, which resulted in an endless cycle of poverty, debts, and landlessness. The land-line system was strengthened by the Mississippi law of 1867, which provided that landlords were to claim lien from the revenue earned by workers. The reduction in income from farmers' earnings was meant to cover the debts the majority of sharecroppers had acquired to buy supplies and cater for their families' needs before the harvest period. The oppression of African Americans in the name of sharecropping continued for years until the Agricultural Adjustment Act was enacted in 1942 in efforts to address the Great Depression. For over eight decades, whatever sharecroppers used to produce in the farms it ended up benefiting landlords more than the producers.

Landowners, Law enforcers and Government Officials Contributions in Spreading Sharecropping

Despite the sharecropping or the peonage violation in southern states being one of the oppressive act in America, the society and the government were not interested in making any difference or secure civil liberty for the less fortunate. For instance, in Florida, a number of workers under Henry Flagler a wealthy Floridian in charge of construction of Florida East Coast Railway had decided to report the poor working conditions they were exposed to by their master. Mainly, the Florida Labor Agency in charge of the railway construction used to lure workers to sign contracts with the company by providing them with false terms and conditions of employment. Fortunately, in 1906, a number of Flagler's employees had a chance to return to New York. They took this opportunity to express their di...