HUMAN ELEMENTS IN COTTON 253 



and failures of the human factors in cotton. Cotton wage 

 hands, croppers, share tenants, small owners, and large 

 planters are presented in case studies. Such cases as are 

 here offered rarely find their way into the texts on eco- 

 nomic history. They represent the average and the type 

 of the agricultural process ; they go behind the statistics 

 and show the cotton system as it works. To those un- 

 familiar with southern agricultural processes, they pos- 

 sess, it is submitted, interpretative as well as descriptive 

 value. The picture of cotton growers as they remain in 

 the situation in which they were born, climb the ladder 

 of tenure, or fail, offers material valuable for interpre- 

 tation of the human factors in cotton. 



THE COTTON CROPPER 



Since he requires no additional capital the plantation 

 laborer may easily set up as a share cropper. He needs 

 only to be willing to take a part of the risk of cotton 

 production and to gain the confidence of the plantation 

 owner. 



J. T. Walker, a Negro, of the Marshall farm community 

 in Macon County, Alabama, while working as a monthly 

 wage hand wished to test his ability in operating a small 

 farm. He secured a plot of ground from his employer, which 

 he worked at odd times while keeping up his regular work 

 as a monthly wage hand. He made a very good cotton and 

 corn crop on his small farm. His experiment was so suc- 

 cessful that he gained confidence in himself and the follow- 

 ing year, contracted with the plantation owner to work on 

 halves as a share cropper. 1 



1 T. J. Edwards in Southern Workman, 1917, cited in Journal 

 American Statistical Association, XIII, 67. 



