The Ruin of the Old Regime 35 



first response was merely an assertion of freedom from re- 

 sponsibility which led them to work when they pleased and 

 shift from plantation to plantation with such disregard for 

 contracts that they earned the distrust of their former 

 masters and disrupted many of the old plantations. 



Of the first factor in the decrease in supply of labor it is 

 hardly necessary to speak at length. Under the slave system 

 many of the women worked in the field and a very natural 

 result of their release was to retire from agriculture, either 

 in order to become home-keepers, subsisting upon "hand 

 laundry" work, with occasional excursions to the fields, at 

 cotton picking or chopping times; or to become domestics 

 in the towns and larger cities. Inasmuch as this movement 

 was one towards greater care of the children and the home, 

 it was, of course, greatly to the advantage of the race. 



The movement of Negroes from the Black Belt in re- 

 sponse to the higher wages offered in Western States and 

 Southern Georgia, was of more grave consequence. The 

 following table quoted by Brooks from the Year Book of 

 the Department of Agriculture, 1876, gives the compara- 

 tive money wages in Southern States. 4 



Comparative Wages Per Year for Farm Hands 

 in Southern States 

 State 1867 1868 



North Carolina $104 $89 



South Carolina 100 93 



Georgia 125 83 



Florida 139 97 



Alabama 117 87 



Mississippi 149 90 



Louisiana 150 104 



Texas 139 130 



Arkansas 158 115 



Tennessee 136 109 



* These averages quoted from the Department of Agriculture 

 are based upon the reports of special agents, and while not exact 

 are the best available indices of the conditions. In addition to 

 these money wages food was furnished. 



