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Chapter 13. Seeking Jobs Outside Agriculture 281
work of the Southern States was in his hand. And he was fully competent to do it.
Every adult was either a skilled laborer or a trained mechanic.®
•
This is a considerable exaggeration. There was, outside agriculture, a
fairly large white laboring class, too. And the great majority of Negroes,
even in the cities, were domestics and unskilled laborers. But, skilled or
unskilled, their protection was that their work was characterized as ^^Negro
jobs” and was usually badly paid.
Right from the beginning the Negroes’ position in the Southern non-
agricultural labor market has been influenced by two forces or trends of
change working in opposite directions. One force Is the general expansion
of the Southern nonagricultural economy. This tends constantly to increase
the employment opportunities for Negroes as well as for whites. The other
force is the competition from white job-seekers. This tends to exclude
Negroes from employment and to press them downward in the occupational
hierarchy. Regarding the second trend, it should be observed that there
had been plenty of racial competition before the Civil War. White artisans
had often vociferously protested against the use of Negroes for skilled
work in the crafts. But as long as the politically most powerful group of
whites had a vested interest in Negro mechanics, the protesting was of little
avail. Even many of the free Negroes had their white protectors. After
Emancipation the Negro artisan was on his own. His former master did
not have the same interest in protecting him against white competitors.
White men usually had little economic interest in having the young Negro
trained for skilled work.
In some cases there were still personal ties between the former slave
owners and their ex-slaves. The Black Codes and the dependent status
of the Negro still made him amenable to exploitation. But all this could
only cushion the effects of Emancipation. It was unthinkable that the white
class of ex-masters would protect the Negroes against their white com-
petitors in the same manner as they had done earlier. Many of them were
impoverished because of the War. Their places were taken by other whites
who had not been brought up in the tradition of “caring for their Negroes.”
Many of them actually shared the competitive viewpoints of the white
working class. This was true for the most part of those contractors, for
instance, who rose from the class of white building workers. Generally, the
Civil War, the Emancipation, the Reconstruction, and the Restoration were
all characterized by a trend toward a consolidation of white interests. And
the poorer classes of whites got more of a say, at least as far as the “place”
of the Negro was concerned.
The result of this pressure is well known and often discussed by both
whites and Negroes in the South. Examples of how Negroes have been
driven out from one kind of a job after another are constantly being
pointed out. There seems to be a definite pattern in this process. It starts
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