812 



SOUTH CAROLINA. 



before the adjournment for the holidays was a 

 general stock law for the State. The repeal 

 of the lien law was proposed but was defeated. 

 Proposed amendments in the election laws led 

 to an excited discussion. The principal change 

 proposed was the adoption of a registration 

 law. In the draughted bill, not only was 

 every voter required to register, and furnish 

 proofs on the damand of the supervisor of 

 his identity and residence, but also to pay a 

 fee for the registration. In the debates, this 

 and similar clauses calculated to restrict the 

 exercise of the franchise were stricken out. 

 "With these stringent provisions for registra- 

 tion, amounting to a limitation of suffrage, it 

 was proposed to impose effectual regulations 

 against frauds and tissue-paper ballots, etc. A 

 bill was brought in requiring all ballots to be 

 of uniform size and printed on plain white 

 paper. Separate ballots were to be deposited 

 for the State, legislative, and county offices, 

 congressional candidates, presidential electors, 

 etc., there being eight different boxes for the 

 different classes of offices. Only one voter 

 was to be admitted at a time. There was 

 much opposition in both parties to the com- 

 promise involved in the proposed election 

 laws. The discussion was not over at the time 

 of the recess. Laws were passed to render 

 the liquor acts of the preceding session more 

 effectual. A revised code of the statutes was 

 adopted. In the previous session, commissions 

 had been appointed for the consideration of 

 amendments in the railroad, militia, election, 

 tax laws, etc. One of these commissions was 

 intrusted with the duty of proposing a plan 

 for amending the Constitution. The minority 

 report of the commission was adopted by the 

 Legislature. This proposed that the Constitu- 

 tion should be revised by the action of a Con- 

 stitutional Convention, instead of by the direct 

 vote of the people on the proposed amend- 

 ments. This mode was in accordance with the 

 former practice, but was strongly opposed to 

 the general popular sentiment, which feared 

 that the constitutional rights most highly 

 treasured by the masses -universal suffrage, 

 free education, and homestead exemption 

 might be swept away by the convention if its 

 action was made final. 



The general stock law made a sweeping 

 change in the rights of farmers and the condi- 

 tions of agriculture. It was felt to be directed 

 against the small farmers, particularly the 

 negro tenant farmers, and to have the same 

 object as the repeal of the lien law would have 

 had. It provided that it shall not be lawful 

 for owners of live-stock to permit their ani- 

 mals to run at large beyond the limits of their 

 own land. Persons finding strange animals on 

 their land may demand of their owners fifty 

 cents for each horse, mule, swine, or horned ani- 

 mal, and twenty -five cents for each sheep, goat, 

 etc., and recover damages for any injury sus- 

 tained. Stray animals seized and unclaimed 

 shall be advertised and sold by the county au- 



thorities. The effect of this law is to require 

 owners of stock to fence in their animals, in- 

 stead of obliging the growers of crops to erect 

 fences for their protection. The law goes into 

 operation at the end of the year 1882. The 

 brief period allowed was felt to be a great hard- 

 ship, and was supposed to be one of the causes 

 of the sudden migration of negro farmers and 

 laborers from Edgefield and other counties 

 which took place in the winter of 1881. Some 

 counties which engage principally in stock- 

 raising were exempted on the condition that a 

 boundary-fence should be built around each 

 county at the expense of the people residing 

 therein. 



In December one of the sudden migratory 

 movements of the colored population of the 

 South which have become familiar under the 

 name of "exodus," commenced in Edgefield 

 County. The failure of the crops in 1881 had 

 impoverished the colored farmers. The stock 

 law was considered unbearable, as they could 

 not build fences to inclose their cattle at once, 

 and would thus be unable to keep live-stock at 

 all. The proposed registration law supplied 

 them, moreover, with a political motive. They 

 had made inquiries about the conditions and 

 prospects of settlers in Arkansas, and received 

 favorable reports. The movement was pre- 

 meditated, and had been publicly discussed and 

 prepared for in the three or four months pre- 

 ceding. The start was made on the 24th of 

 December, and before the 31st as many as 

 5,000 had left their homes in this county. The 

 county was thus stripped in one week of one 

 fifth of the laboring population. The section 

 known as the Kidge, extending from Lexing- 

 ton County boundary along the line of the 

 Charlotte, Columbia and Augusta Railroad to 

 Trenton, twenty-four miles long and four or 

 five miles broad, was left with scarcely a sin- 

 gle laborer. The emigrating negroes com- 

 plained that their efforts for ten years to ob- 

 tain a living and improve their condition had 

 failed on account of the exorbitant rents and 

 prices of provisions, and that their political 

 rights were denied them, their ballots were 

 not counted, and they were not even permitted 

 to sign petitions against the passage of the 

 stock law, which would make existence im- 

 possible for them. The majority of the emi- 

 grants worked under a tenancy system. They 

 rented land and paid a stipulated quantity of 

 cotton for each acre. A bale of ginned cotton 

 was paid for from six to ten acres of land. The 

 tenant furnished his own fertilizers, stock, and 

 tools. The soil was very thin, and required a 

 large quantity of guano. In other parts of the 

 county the one third, or share system, of ten- 

 ancy is in operation. From these districts 

 very few of the negroes joined the exodus. 

 Under this system the planters furnish the 

 stock and implements, and receive two thirds 

 of the crop. They also furnish the negroes 

 with their supplies, and exact less exorbitant 

 prices than the merchants. The profits charged 



