The Colonel's Dream Page 27

  _Twenty-seven_

  His first step was to have Caxton look up and abstract for him thecriminal laws of the State. They were bad enough, in all conscience.Men could be tried without jury and condemned to infamous punishments,involving stripes and chains, for misdemeanours which in moreenlightened States were punished with a small fine or brief detention.There were, for instance, no degrees of larceny, and the heaviestpunishment might be inflicted, at the discretion of the judge, for theleast offense.

  The vagrancy law, of which the colonel had had some experience, was anopen bid for injustice and "graft" and clearly designed to profit thestrong at the expense of the weak. The crop-lien laws were little morethan the instruments of organised robbery. To these laws the colonelcalled the attention of some of his neighbours with whom he was onterms of intimacy. The enlightened few had scarcely known of theirexistence, and quite agreed that the laws were harsh and ought to bechanged.

  But when the colonel, pursuing his inquiry, undertook to investigatethe operation of these laws, he found an appalling condition. Thestatutes were mild and beneficent compared with the results obtainedunder cover of them. Caxton spent several weeks about the Statelooking up the criminal records, and following up the sentencesinflicted, working not merely for his fee, but sharing the colonel'sindignation at the state of things unearthed. Convict labour wascontracted out to private parties, with little or no effective Statesupervision, on terms which, though exceedingly profitable to theState, were disastrous to free competitive labour. More than onelawmaker besides Fetters was numbered among these contractors.

  Leaving the realm of crime, they found that on hundreds of farms,ignorant Negroes, and sometimes poor whites, were held in bondageunder claims of debt, or under contracts of exclusive employment forlong terms of years--contracts extorted from ignorance by craft, aidedby State laws which made it a misdemeanour to employ such personselsewhere. Free men were worked side by side with convicts from thepenitentiary, and women and children herded with the most depravedcriminals, thus breeding a criminal class to prey upon the State.

  In the case of Fetters alone the colonel found a dozen instances wherethe law, bad as it was, had not been sufficient for Fetters's purpose,but had been plainly violated. Caxton discovered a discharged guard ofFetters, who told him of many things that had taken place at Sycamore;and brought another guard one evening, at that time employed there,who told him, among other things, that Bud Johnson's life, owing tohis surliness and rebellious conduct, and some spite which Hainesseemed to bear against him, was simply a hell on earth--that even astrong Negro could not stand it indefinitely.

  A case was made up and submitted to the grand jury. Witnesses weresummoned at the colonel's instance. At the last moment they allweakened, even the discharged guard, and their testimony was notsufficient to justify an indictment.

  The colonel then sued out a writ of habeas corpus for the body of BudJohnson, and it was heard before the common pleas court at Clarendon,with public opinion divided between the colonel and Fetters. The courtheld that under his contract, for which he had paid the consideration,Fetters was entitled to Johnson's services.

  The colonel, defeated but still undismayed, ordered Caxton to preparea memorial for presentation to the federal authorities, calling theirattention to the fact that peonage, a crime under the Federalstatutes, was being flagrantly practised in the State. This allegationwas supported by a voluminous brief, giving names and dates andparticular instances of barbarity. The colonel was not without somequiet support in this movement; there were several public-spirited menin the county, including his able lieutenant Caxton, Dr. Price and oldGeneral Thornton, none of whom were under any obligation to Fetters,and who all acknowledged that something ought to be done to purge theState of a great disgrace.

  There was another party, of course, which deprecated any scandal whichwould involve the good name of the State or reflect upon the South,and who insisted that in time these things would pass away and therewould be no trace of them in future generations. But the colonelinsisted that so also would the victims of the system pass away, who,being already in existence, were certainly entitled to as muchconsideration as generations yet unborn; it was hardly fair tosacrifice them to a mere punctilio. The colonel had reached theconviction that the regenerative forces of education andenlightenment, in order to have any effect in his generation, must bereinforced by some positive legislative or executive action, or elsethe untrammelled forces of graft and greed would override them; and hewas human enough, at this stage of his career to wish to see theresult of his labours, or at least a promise of result.

  The colonel's papers were forwarded to the proper place, whence theywere referred from official to official, and from department todepartment. That it might take some time to set in motion themachinery necessary to reach the evil, the colonel knew very well, andhence was not impatient at any reasonable delay. Had he known that hispresentation had created a sensation in the highest quarter, but thatowing to the exigencies of national politics it was not deemed wise,at that time, to do anything which seemed like an invasion of Staterights or savoured of sectionalism, he might not have been so serenelyconfident of the outcome. Nor had Fetters known as much, would he havedone the one thing which encouraged the colonel more than anythingelse. Caxton received a message one day from Judge Bullard,representing Fetters, in which Fetters made the offer that if ColonelFrench would stop his agitation on the labour laws, and withdraw anypapers he had filed, and promise to drop the whole matter, he wouldrelease Bud Johnson.

  The colonel did not hesitate a moment. He had gone into this fight forJohnson--or rather to please Miss Laura. He had risen now to highergame; nothing less than the system would satisfy him.

  "But, Colonel," said Caxton, "it's pretty hard on the nigger. They'llkill him before his time's up. If you'll give me a free hand, I'll gethim anyway."

  "How?"

  "Perhaps it's just as well you shouldn't know. But I have friends atSycamore."

  "You wouldn't break the law?" asked the colonel.

  "Fetters is breaking the law," replied Caxton. "He's holding Johnsonfor debt--and whether that is lawful or not, he certainly has no rightto kill him."

  "You're right," replied the colonel. "Get Johnson away, I don't carehow. The end justifies the means--that's an argument that goes downhere. Get him away, and send him a long way off, and he can write forhis wife to join him. His escape need not interfere with our otherplans. We have plenty of other cases against Fetters."

  Within a week, Johnson, with the connivance of a bribed guard, apoor-white man from Clarendon, had escaped from Fetters and seeminglyvanished from Beaver County. Fetters's lieutenants were active intheir search for him, but sought in vain.