Negroes employed as house servants had, at “all hours of the day and night, and on all days of the week,” to answer promptly all calls and execute all lawful orders and commands of the master’s family. They had to be especially civil and polite to their master, his family, and guests, for which they in turn should “receive gentle and kind treatment.”
The statute provided for a regular form of contract between master and servant, which was understood to include all of the above stipulations unless otherwise provided.
APPRENTICE LAWS
The early legislatures also made detailed apprentice laws. Although it is scarcely open to argument that, in making such laws, they did not have in mind primarily Negroes, still many of the statutes made no mention of race, and, therefore, cannot be properly discussed here. Thus, Alabama[[106]] had a long statute on apprentices, but the only reference to the Negro was the rule that, if the minor be a child of a freedman, the former owner of the child should have the preference of apprenticing him, if a suitable person.
In Kentucky,[[107]] if the apprentice was white, the master must teach him reading, writing, and common arithmetic up to and including the “Rule of Three”; if a Negro, the master must pay at the end of the apprenticeship fifty dollars to a girl and one hundred dollars to a boy, but if the master should teach the apprentice to read and write, he was not bound to pay any money. In Kentucky, also, in apprenticing Negroes, preference was given to their former owners, if the latter were suitable persons.
Mississippi[[108]] had an elaborate apprentice law which related only to freedmen, free Negroes, and mulattoes. The sheriffs, justices of the peace, and other civil officers of the county had to report to the probate court semiannually, in January and July, the names of all freedmen, free Negroes, and mulattoes, under the age of eighteen, who where orphans or whose parents were unable or unwilling to support them. It was the duty of the court, thereupon, to order the apprenticing of such minors, preference being given to their former masters if suitable persons. The master had to furnish a bond payable to the State conditioned upon his furnishing the minor with sufficient food and clothing, treating him humanely, giving him medical attention when sick, and, if the minor was under fifteen, teaching him or having him taught to read and write. Males were bound till they were twenty-one; females, till they were eighteen. The master could inflict moderate corporal chastisement as a father or guardian might do; but in no case could he inflict cruel or inhuman punishment.
If the apprentice ran away, the master might pursue him and bring him before a justice of the peace who could remand him to the service of his master. If the apprentice refused to return, he might be put into jail until the next term of the court, when his case would be investigated. If it was found that he left without cause, he could be punished like a hired freedman; but if he had a good cause, the court might discharge him and enter judgment against his master for not over one hundred dollars to be paid to the apprentice. Anyone enticing an apprentice away from his master, knowingly employing him, furnishing him food or clothing, or giving or selling him liquor without the master’s consent was guilty of a high misdemeanor.
If the master wished to get rid of the apprentice, he might go before the probate court, which could cancel his bond, and re-apprentice the minor. If the master died, the court in re-apprenticing would give preference to the widow or other member of the family of the deceased. If the master wished to move to another State and take his apprentice with him, he had to execute a bond conditioned upon his compliance with the apprentice laws of the State to which he was going. Any parent of a free Negro or mulatto might apprentice his minor child, and if the age could not be fixed by record testimony, the court fixed it.
The only race distinction made by North Carolina[[109]] was the law that no white child should be bound to a colored master or mistress, and this came in 1874—long after the period here considered.
The apprentice laws of South Carolina[[110]] which applied only to Negroes were almost as elaborate as those of Mississippi. A child over two years of age, born of a colored parent, might be bound as an apprentice to any respectable white or colored person; if a male, till he was twenty-one; if a female, till she was eighteen. Illegitimate children might be bound out by their mother. If the child had no parent in the district; or if his parents were paupers, or unable to support him, or were not teaching him the habits of industry and honesty, or were of a notoriously bad character or vagrants, or if either of them had been convicted of an infamous crime, he might be apprenticed by the district judge or by a magistrate. Males of twelve and females of ten had to sign the contract of apprenticeship and were bound thereby; but their refusal to sign would not affect the validity of the instrument. If the apprenticeship was voluntary, the contract had to be under seal, signed by the master, parent, and apprentice, attested by two credible witnesses, and approved by the district judge or magistrate. One copy of the contract was kept by the master, another, filed in the office of the clerk of court. The master had to pay three dollars for the approval of the contract by the district judge or magistrate.