IX. The Negro and the Labor Question.
Competency is a prerequisite to all occupations. I have alluded to this above, but I desire to treat it more at length here, and especially in its relation to the Negro of the South.
In consequence of former conditions, incompetency has been the normal standard of both employer and employe. The conditions being changed, and new relations existing between these two classes in the South, the standard must be changed—must be raised. I shall put aside sentimentalism, and view the subject in its true light.
What is the "Negro Labor Problem" of the future?
Simply the ability on the part of the Negro to remain in the market as a laborer, and the ability of the Southern white man to meet the labor complications of the future, which will be developed in the necessity for better skilled labor, and the desire of the white man to get this superior labor at the old prices.
Leaving competency and skill out of the question, it will be readily admitted that the Negro is the most desirable of all races as a laborer. He is kind, forgiving, and easily understood and managed. He is willing to work and at almost any price. This is shown in the fact that there is a larger per cent. of bread winners in the Southern States than any other section, except in the far West and East. But he is ignorant, improvident and unskilled; and it is to be regretted that his progress is slow in the cultivation of skill in the industries, but there are fruitful and encouraging signs in this direction.
There are two causes which tend to demand a higher standard of labor qualification in the South:
1. The more free intermixture of northern and southern people—thereby bringing the southern people in contact with the superior white labor of the North.
2. The immigration of northern people who have been accustomed to cultivated, free labor.
We do not pretend to hint that the Negro laborer will not improve, but will he do so sufficiently and rapidly enough to meet the heavy demand?