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[CHAPTER 34]
[Page 1]
Farm and Rural Labor, 1900-1930.
Negroes were forcibly seized and brought to America because their race proved to be the best available labor supply. Today in Louisiana--as in most of the other Southern States--they are still the best “perpetual” laboring group that can be found. Wherever there is work to be done, either pleasant or unpleasant, black labor is called upon to make the wheels of progress keep turning smoothly and steadily. Canefields, rice-fields, swamps, truck farms, plantations, and rural and urban communities have come to rely in many instances, solely upon Negro laborers to supply their demands. In common and skilled labor they are employed throughout the State, toiling in industry, agriculture, and domestic service. With a skeleton franchise which he can employ only in national elections, the Negro workers of Louisiana have fought successfully for a place in the various industries of the State. Their increasing success may be one of the reasons why trade unions are more and more reaching out to them for inclusion in labor movements which affect alike the workers of both races.
The post-Reconstruction period was one in which Negro labor had fought a steadily losing battle against poor wages, immigrant labor, repressive measures,
Swing that hoe,
Lift that bale….
From Old Man River By Jerome Kern.
[Note that the quotation in this box appears in a later version of this document and is not present in “The Negro in Louisiana.”
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