“Grant was the one that killed the Republican party. We ain’t had but three real Republican presidents since the war—Garfield, McKinley and Teddy Roosevelt. They killed Garfield, and they killed McKinley, and they tried to kill Teddy Roosevelt. Well, they asked Grant if they could make state constitutions. Grant said, ‘Yes, if they didn’t conflict with the national constitution.’ But they did conflict and Grant didn’t do nothin’ about it.”
Schooling, Antebellum and Postbellum
“Northern teachers were sent down here after the war and they charged a dollar a month until the State set up schools. Some of the Niggers learned enough in the six months school to teach, and some white persons taught.
“In slave times, they didn’t have any schools for Niggers. Niggers better not be caught with a book. If he were caught with a book they beat him to death nearly. Niggers used to get hold of this Webster’s Blue Back Book and the white folks would catch them and take them away. They didn’t allow no free Niggers to go to school either in slave times.”
Share Cropping
“I used to see Niggers in Georgia share cropping. Nigger work all the year. Christmas eve night they would be going back to the plantation singing—done lost everything—sitting on the wagon singing:
‘Sho’ pity Lawd forgive
That ar’ pentant rebel live.’
“Then they would have to get clothes and food against the next year’s crop. Then you’d see ’em on the wagon again driving back to the plantation loaded down with provisions, singing:
‘Lawd revive us agin
All our increase comes from thee.’
“I used to study how them people could live. They didn’t give but ten dollars a month for common labor. They didn’t give anything to the share cropper. They took all of it. They said he spent it, borrowed it, and on like that.”