consideration
so small as to be almost nominal. A man must be in abject poverty when
he is willing to work an entire week for a sum usually accorded in the
Norther States for the labor of one day. But only a community blind to
public justice and to public decency as well, could enact a law that in
effect declares the poverty of the laborer to be a crime, in
consideration of which he shall be deprived of the beggarly mite for
which he is willing to give the sweat of his face.

Apparently fearing that the operations of the law already referred to
would not secure a sufficient number of laborers for the work required
in the city, the law-makers of Alabama authorized the municipal
government of Mobile to "restrain and prohibit the nightly and other
meetings or disorderly assemblies of all persons, and to punish for
such offenses by affixing penalties not exceeding fifty dollars for
any one offense; and in case of the inability of any such person to
pay and satisfy said fine or penalty and the cost thereof, to sentence
such person to labor for said city for such reasonable time, not
exceeding six calendar months, for any one offense, as may be deemed
equivalent to such penalty and costs, which labor shall be such as may
be designated by the mayor, aldermen, and common council of the city."

Power was thus given to consider any evening meeting of colored persons
a disorderly one, and to arrest all who were participating in it.
Nothing was more natural than that the negroes, with their social and
even gregarious habits, should, in their new estate of freedom, be
disposed to assemble for the purpose of considering their own interests
and their future prospects. It is eminently to the discredit of the
State of Alabama and of the city of Mobile that so innocent a purpose
should be thwarted, perverted, made criminal and punished.

The fact will not escape attention that in these enactments the words
"master," "mistress," and "servant" are constantly used, and that under
the operation of the laws a form of servitude was re-established, more
heartless and more cruel than the slavery which had been abolished.
Under the institution of slavery a certain attachment would spring up
between the master and his salve, and with it came a certain protection
to the latter against want and against suffering in his old age. With
all its wrongfulness and its many cruelties, there were ameliorations
in the slave system which softened its asp