The Booker T. Washington Papers, Vol.3, page 365, Sept. 1893, U. of Illinois Press

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SEPTEMBER I 893 he said, and that was intelligent labor. The crop lien system has fastened its fangs on all forms of business affecting the white-man as well as the black man. Farmers who are compelled to raise their crops under this mortgage system are charged an interest on the goods that ranges from 25 to 50 per cent. Mr. Washington said: SHYLOCK S POUND OF FLE S H ''It is safe to say that of the colored farmers of the black belt of the South three-fourths are to-day in debt for supplies to raise last year's crop; and it is safe to say four-fifths are in debt for supplies furnished to make the present crop, and these four-fifths live in small one-room cabins. This system affects the black man not only industrially but morally as well. Recently a money-lender living near Tuskegee expressed the situation very accurately when he said: 'When the crop is being made the negroes get all they can out of me, and after it is made I get all I can out of them.' During slavery the negroes reasoned something like this: 'My body belongs to my master, and taking the master's chickens to feed master's body is not stealing.' And some are inclined to apply this kind of logic to the mortgage system, and it ~ not hard for you to judge some of the results of this kind of reasoning. This system has grown until these liens are not only put on the crop, but on cows, mules, hogs, wagons, chickens, etc.'' President Washington, to show what the negro would do if he but had the opportunity, told the story of the Tuskegee Institute. Twelve years ~ago] the land where the institute now stands was an abandoned cotton plantation. Mr. Washington, with his fellow workers, went there with nothing but the determination to start an industrial school. They sent out word of their plan and pupils flocked in. To supply food the students cultivated the farm, to' get building materials they started a sawmill, a brick yard, carpenter's department, blacksmithing, tinsmithing, masonry, and kindred trades. Within these twelve years these students have erected almost wholly with their own hands twenty-four buildings and created property worth $~8s,ooo free of debt. The students are now cultivating 500 acres of land, have manufactured this season over half a million bricks, built any number of wagons and buggies, manufactured a steam engine and a number of other things. The printing for white and colored of that whole county is done in the institute printing office. Within the last few weeks they have been 365