Peonage was a type of involuntary servitude of laborers having little control over their
employment conditions. Peonage existed historically during the colonial period, especially in
Latin America and areas of Spanish rule.
English usage The English words peon and peonage were derived
from the Spanish word, and have a variety of meanings related to the Spanish usage,
as well as some other meanings. In addition to the meaning of forced laborer, a peon may
also be a person with little authority, often assigned unskilled tasks; an underling or
otherwise a personage who is subject to the whims of their overseers. In this sense, peon
can be used in either a derogatory or self-effacing context.
However, the term has a historical basis and usage related to much more severe conditions
of forced labor. American English: in a historical and legal
sense, peon generally referred to someone working in an unfree labor system. The word
often implied debt bondage and/or indentured servitude.
There are other usages in contemporary cultures: South Asian English: a peon is an office boy,
an attendant, or an orderly, a person kept around for odd jobs. or its wood, especially
when used in boat-building.) Shanghai: among native Chinese working in
firms where English is spoken, the word has been phonetically reinterpreted as "pee-on"),
and refers to a worker with little authority, who suffers indignities from superiors.
Computing slang: a peon is an "unprivileged user"—a person without special privileges
on a computer system The other extreme is "superuser".
Financial trading slang: a peon is a market participant who trades in small quantities
or a small account. Peonage
The origin of this form of involuntary servitude goes back to the Spanish conquest of Mexico
when conquistadors forced natives to work for Spanish planters and mine operators. Peonage
was prevalent in Spanish America especially in the countries of Mexico, Guatemala, Ecuador,
and Peru. It remains an important part of social life, as among the Urarina of the Peruvian
Amazon. After the American Civil War, peonage developed
in the Southern United States. Poor white farmers and freedmen who could not afford
their own land would farm another person's land, exchanging labor for a share of the
crops. This was called sharecropping and initially the benefits were mutual. The land owner would
pay for the seeds and tools in exchange for a percentage of the money earned from the
crop and a portion of the crop. As time passed, many landowners began to abuse this system.
The landowner would force the tenant farmer to buy seeds and tools from the land owner’s
store, which often had inflated prices. As sharecroppers were often illiterate, they
had to depend on the books and accounting by the landowner and his staff. Other tactics
included debiting expenses against the sharecropper's profits after the crop was harvested and "miscalculating"
the net profit from the harvest, thereby keeping the sharecropper in perpetual debt to the
landowner. Since the tenant farmers could not offset the costs, they were forced into
involuntary labor due to the debts they owed the land owner.
Southern states passed "Black Codes" to control the movement of freedmen and to try to gain
their labor for planters. They often declared as vagrant someone who was unemployed, even
if between jobs. They tried to restrict the movement of freedmen between rural areas and
cities, to between towns. Under such laws, local officials arbitrarily arrested tens
of thousands of freedmen and charged them with fines and the court costs of their cases.
White merchants, farmers, and business owners could pay their debts and the prisoner had
to work off the debt. Prisoners were leased as laborers to owners and operators of coal
mines, lumber camps, brickyards, railroads, quarries, and farm plantations, with the revenues
for their labor going to the states. Government officials leased imprisoned blacks and whites
to small town entrepreneurs, provincial farmers, and dozens of corporations looking for cheap
labor.. Their labor was repeatedly bought and sold for decades after the official abolition
of American slavery. Southern states and private businesses boomed
with this free labor. It is estimated that up to 40% of blacks in the South were imprisoned
in peonage in the beginning of the 20th century. Overseers and owners often used severe deprivation,
beatings, whippings, and other abuse as "discipline" against the workers.
After the Civil War, the Thirteenth Amendment prohibited involuntary servitude such as peonage
for all but convicted criminals. Congress also passed various laws to protect the constitutional
rights of Southern blacks, making those who violated such rights by conspiracy, by trespass,
or in disguise, guilty of an offense punishable by ten years in prison and civil disability.
Unlawful use of state law to subvert rights under the Federal Constitution was made punishable
by fine or a year's imprisonment. Until the 1960s, sharecroppers in Southern states were
forced to continue working to pay off old debts or to pay taxes. Southern states allowed
this in order to preserve sharecropping. In October 1910 Florida sugar cane plantation
planter Edgar Watson was shot and killed by his own neighbors; according to legend he
would use peonage Native American and Negro help and then would "pay" his workers by killing
them. His story was fictionalized by writer Peter Matthiessen in his Lost River Trilogy
later remade into Shadow Country The following reported Court cases involving
Peonage: 1903 South Dakota a 17 year old girl was reported
to have been sold into peonage at the age of two by her own father
1904 Alabama ten persons Indicted for holding black and white persons in peonage
John W. Pace of Alabama-the "father" of Peonage; pardoned by his friend President Theodore
Roosevelt in 1906. Edward McCree of Georgia Legislature; owner
of 37,000 acres of land; indicted on 13 charges. Pled guilty to first charge and payed a $1,000.00
fine. 1906 Five officials of Jackson Lumber Company
sentenced in Pensacola Florida to seven years in prison.
1916 two men found guilty in Lexington County South Carolina of trying to force a white
man into peonage; each fined $500.00 and sentenced to a year and day in jail
1921 HAwaiian Sugar Plantation owners try to Legalize peonage of Chinese workers.
In 1921, Georgia farmer John S. Williams and his black overseer Clyde Manning were convicted
in the deaths of 11 blacks working as peons in Williams' farm. Williams was the only white
farmer convicted for killing black peons between 1877 and 1966.
Because of the Spanish tradition, peonage was still widespread in New Mexico after the
US Civil War. Because New Mexico laws supported peonage, the US Congress passed an anti-peonage
law on March 2, 1867 as follows: "Sec 1990. The holding of any person to service or labor
under the system known as peonage is abolished and forever prohibited in the territory of
New Mexico, or in any other territory or state of the United States; and all acts, laws,
… made to establish, maintain, or enforce, directly or indirectly, the voluntary or involuntary
service or labour of any persons as peons, in liquidation of any debt or obligation,
or otherwise, are declared null and void." The current version of this statute is codified
at Chapter 21-I of 42 U.S.C. § 1994 and makes no specific mention of New Mexico.
See also Debt bondage
Feudalism Peasant
Proletariat Serfdom
Social class Hodges v. United States, 203 U.S. 1
Bailey v. Alabama, 219 U.S. 219 Boy Slaves
References
External links Conversation With Erminio Orellana Mini Documentary
by Jorge Uzon 42 USC § 1994 - Peonage Abolished
FBI.gov Further reading
Daniel, Pete. The Shadow of Slavery: Peonage in the South, 1901-1969. New York: Oxford
University Press. ISBN 0-19-519742-9. Reynolds, Aaron, "Inside the Jackson Tract:
The Battle Over Peonage Labor Camps in Southern Alabama, 1906," Southern Spaces, 21 January
2013. Whayne, Jeannie M., ed. Shadows over Sunnyside:
An Arkansas Plantation in Transition, 1830–1945, Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press,
1993. Woodruff, Nan Elizabeth. American Congo: The
African American Freedom Struggle in the Delta, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003.