The history of chain gains and convict labor is depressing. A workaround for the 13th amendment.

True. But that was exploited in many parts of the country with vague vagrancy laws, etc, that were largely aimed at African Americans and carried harsh sentences with no oversight.

I'm going to have to agree. Not all, or most of convict labor was black. But many were. In some jurisdictions, the people who needed labor (say, road contractors) would tell the judges how many men they needed for a road project. The judges would then add up the convicts, determine the shortfall, then get harsher in sentencing new criminals to make up the difference.

If you ever go to Houston, oh you better walk right
And you better not squallow and you better not fight
Sheriff Rocko will arrest you, Eddie Boone will take you down
You can bet your bottom dollar, penitentiary bound

ChiliBeans said:

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If you ever go to Houston, oh you better walk right
And you better not squallow and you better not fight
Sheriff Rocko will arrest you, Eddie Boone will take you down
You can bet your bottom dollar, penitentiary bound

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What is that from?

There is a great book called "Slavery By Another Name" covers this. The system existed until at least FDR and was mostly ended after publicized deaths of white victims.

It seemed that the system was really bad after Reconstruction and the "convicts" were treated worse than slaves simply because the owner had very little money invested relatively speaking.

Smokedraw01 said:

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ChiliBeans said:

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If you ever go to Houston, oh you better walk right
And you better not squallow and you better not fight
Sheriff Rocko will arrest you, Eddie Boone will take you down
You can bet your bottom dollar, penitentiary bound

---

What is that from?

There is a great book called "Slavery By Another Name" covers this. The system existed until at least FDR and was mostly ended after publicized deaths of white victims.

It seemed that the system was really bad after Reconstruction and the "convicts" were treated worse than slaves simply because the owner had very little money invested relatively speaking.

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Thanks. I didn't realize that song was from an old prison tune and one that was recorded at angola prison by Lead Belly.

Yeah, you can find Lead Belly's version on youtube. Listened to the song for years before I found out what it was about.

I think the song was written about Houston during Jim Crow and the prison mentioned in the song is the Farm at Sugarland, not the Louisiana prison in Angola. Leadbelly's version lists the name of the sheriff and calls the jailer or bailiff the "boomer", I think (been a long tie since I listened to the song, though). Supposedly, if the train going by the Farm shined its light on a convict, the convict was soon to be released.

Some of the Ledbelly recordings he clearly says Huntsville instead of prison.

Tee said:

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I think the song was written about Houston during Jim Crow and the prison mentioned in the song is the Farm at Sugarland, not the Louisiana prison in Angola. Leadbelly's version lists the name of the sheriff and calls the jailer or bailiff the "boomer", I think (been a long tie since I listened to the song, though). Supposedly, if the train going by the Farm shined its light on a convict, the convict was soon to be released.

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The recordings were made at Angola by John Lomax as part of a collaboration with the Library of Congress.

Early Sugarland was pretty much built with convict labor