if it worked after slavery, it should still work after the immigration raids
so, one of the things weighing me down this semester is this paper i am writing on the Chinese who were imported to the Mississippi Delta region following reconstruction. This was a completely agricultural society, it can't be underestimated how patriarchal it was - white planters were on the top, and even though most white people weren't that rich, they admired and wished for the planting life.
After slavery had been ripped from under thier feet, these planters needed someone to still do the work - and they were sortof shocked to have to treat people they had never thought of as human, as "equals"? yea right. So they figured out this neat system of tenant farming, so much endebting their workers that even though they were now "freedmen," they weren't making any money. (the debt comes from the advancement of supplies, food, rent, etc. - it's like old-school, "you're shirt and cap will come out of your first check.")
Needless to say, these freedmen weren't to siked about all this. The one power that was definetly in their hands, which hadn't been previously under slavery, was the power to leave. And this happened, a lot. If a planter was completely, obscenly horrible, he had problems getting his workers to come back the next year. That really sucked for him, because his plantations were miles by miles large and shit would sink if he didn't have enough labor.
Facing the problem of not having enough labor, (i.e., not treating ex-slaves well enough that they would put up with the bullshit,) planters tried many solutions, which is where the Chinese came in. They were doing so well on the Rail roads, hey, coolies, awesome, i hear their brains are bigger than negros and my cousin told me they were "docile." It turned out coolies didn't dig that shit, they sortof liked respect. So the planters moved on - and one of the most successful methods they came up with to continue a nearly exactly indentical system to slavery was PRISON LABOR.
see, the thing that's cool about prison labor, is that at the same time you are punishing your negro workers for leaving you! because since you have all the political power, you can create "vagrancy laws" etc. which of course target black men only! and make it a felony to steal anything over like $5. Sweet! now all these folks are back, as prisoners, and this is really, really, cool, like even BETTER than slavery really, because it's not really your responsibility if your workers die! The laws you and your cronies passed sorta overflowed the prisions, so the state "rents" out their prisoners to you - do ya dig it? It's an endless supply of labor you don't even have to worry about keeping healthy!!!
Back to today. you may or may not know that there have been immigration raids on a ton of agriculture and other buisnesses in the past year. so now they're like, "who can work for us?" Well, this time you don't even need to make laws for it, there already ARE a ton of brown people in jail..... great.
http://www.racewire.org/archives/2007/08/migrant_workers_uprooted_farme.html
After slavery had been ripped from under thier feet, these planters needed someone to still do the work - and they were sortof shocked to have to treat people they had never thought of as human, as "equals"? yea right. So they figured out this neat system of tenant farming, so much endebting their workers that even though they were now "freedmen," they weren't making any money. (the debt comes from the advancement of supplies, food, rent, etc. - it's like old-school, "you're shirt and cap will come out of your first check.")
Needless to say, these freedmen weren't to siked about all this. The one power that was definetly in their hands, which hadn't been previously under slavery, was the power to leave. And this happened, a lot. If a planter was completely, obscenly horrible, he had problems getting his workers to come back the next year. That really sucked for him, because his plantations were miles by miles large and shit would sink if he didn't have enough labor.
Facing the problem of not having enough labor, (i.e., not treating ex-slaves well enough that they would put up with the bullshit,) planters tried many solutions, which is where the Chinese came in. They were doing so well on the Rail roads, hey, coolies, awesome, i hear their brains are bigger than negros and my cousin told me they were "docile." It turned out coolies didn't dig that shit, they sortof liked respect. So the planters moved on - and one of the most successful methods they came up with to continue a nearly exactly indentical system to slavery was PRISON LABOR.
see, the thing that's cool about prison labor, is that at the same time you are punishing your negro workers for leaving you! because since you have all the political power, you can create "vagrancy laws" etc. which of course target black men only! and make it a felony to steal anything over like $5. Sweet! now all these folks are back, as prisoners, and this is really, really, cool, like even BETTER than slavery really, because it's not really your responsibility if your workers die! The laws you and your cronies passed sorta overflowed the prisions, so the state "rents" out their prisoners to you - do ya dig it? It's an endless supply of labor you don't even have to worry about keeping healthy!!!
Back to today. you may or may not know that there have been immigration raids on a ton of agriculture and other buisnesses in the past year. so now they're like, "who can work for us?" Well, this time you don't even need to make laws for it, there already ARE a ton of brown people in jail..... great.
http://www.racewire.org/archives/2007/08/migrant_workers_uprooted_farme.html