Unfettered: A Novel

by Sutton E. Griggs

In practically every Southern city there are certain sections inhabited almost exclusively by the poorer, shiftless, more ignorant class of Negroes. The houses in these Negro settlements are small, dilapidated and often situated in marshy regions. The streets or alleys thereof are narrow and crooked and destitute of drainage. In such sections barrooms thrive, gambling dens flourish, and gathering places are afforded for lewd women and vicious men. By day Negro women in filthy, unbecoming attire, barefooted and bareheaded, congregate in the street and engage in loud, unseemly talk. Idle Negro men are to be seen lounging around these settlements. Garbage is emptied into the streets there to remain. Such settlements as these breed disease and are menaces to the health of the cities. They are the places where crimes and criminals of all kinds are developed. They mar the beauty of the cities and keep down the price of real estate in their neighborhoods. They do much to bring the whole Negro race into disrepute. A revolution must be wrought in these settlements at all hazards. The more refined among the Negroes must be employed to labor among the masses and thus ameliorate the ills herein set forth. Tracts of land should be purchased just beyond corporate limits, in easy access to the business centers. Commodious houses should be constructed and sold to the Negroes at moderate prices and on easy terms.

"YE HAVE THE POOR WITH YOU ALWAYS."

The earnings of the Negroes being small, they have but little opportunity to accumulate a surplus for old age and decrepitude. This evil is accentuated by improvidence. So long as these conditions exist, there must be aged Negroes unable to take care of themselves. For these homes should be established.

Orphan Asylums are sadly needed and must be provided for the tens of thousands of young cast adrift annually through the deaths of impoverished parents. At present youthful Negro offenders are sent to prisons where they are in daily contact with hardened criminals. Reformatories must be established where these beginners in crime may be lured from the paths of vice, instead of being the better educated for evil as at present.

Comparisons unfavorable to the Negro have been so often instituted that the passion for appearing as well or better than the whites has taken hold of many. Living side by side with a wealthy rival race, the Negro often overstrains himself in an endeavor to keep well in sight of the white man. As outgrowths of this condition their church houses, very often, their dwellings, the furnishings for their homes, their dress are wont to cost more than their earnings would warrant. There are money-seeking men who have discovered the depths of this desire of the Negro to appear well.

They have formed loan companies and accept mortgages on all sorts of possessions of the Negroes and exact rates of interest that are astounding.

Dealers in various lines of ware do not hesitate to sell to the Negroes the most costly articles on the installment plan, taking care to place charges thereon far above their real value. Thus the meagre earnings of the race are so largely absorbed in the manner indicated. It means perpetual poverty to the masses unless corrected.

Negroes must be taught to live simply, in keeping with their financial condition. Penny saving banks must everywhere be established, and forces set to work to urge the Negroes to save their money, thus counteracting the influence of the myriad loan offices that tempt them to their financial ruin.