History's lessons but record
One death-grapple in the darkness
'Twixt old systems and the Word;
Truth forever on the scaffold,
Wrong forever on the throne;
Yet that scaffold sways the future,
And behind the dim unknown
Standeth God within the shadow
Keeping watch above His own.
LOWELL.
The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line,—the relation of the darker to the lighter2 races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea. It was a phase of this problem that caused the Civil War; and however much they who marched South and North in 1861 may have fixed3 on the technical points, of union and local autonomy as a shibboleth4, all nevertheless knew, as we know, that the question of Negro slavery was the real cause of the conflict. Curious it was, too, how this deeper question ever forced itself to the surface despite effort and disclaimer. No sooner had Northern armies touched Southern soil than this old question, newly guised5, sprang from the earth,—What shall be done with Negroes? Peremptory7 military commands this way and that, could not answer the query8; the Emancipation9 Proclamation seemed but to broaden and intensify10 the difficulties; and the War Amendments12 made the Negro problems of to-day.
It is the aim of this essay to study the period of history from 1861 to 1872 so far as it relates to the American Negro. In effect, this tale of the dawn of Freedom is an account of that government of men called the Freedmen's Bureau,—one of the most singular and interesting of the attempts made by a great nation to grapple with vast problems of race and social condition.
The war has naught13 to do with slaves, cried Congress, the President, and the Nation; and yet no sooner had the armies, East and West, penetrated14 Virginia and Tennessee than fugitive15 slaves appeared within their lines. They came at night, when the flickering16 camp-fires shone like vast unsteady stars along the black horizon: old men and thin, with gray and tufted hair; women with frightened eyes, dragging whimpering hungry children; men and girls, stalwart and gaunt,—a horde17 of starving vagabonds, homeless, helpless, and pitiable, in their dark distress18. Two methods of treating these newcomers seemed equally logical to opposite sorts of minds. Ben Butler, in Virginia, quickly declared slave property contraband19 of war, and put the fugitives20 to work; while Fremont, in Missouri, declared the slaves free under martial21 law. Butler's action was approved, but Fremont's was hastily countermanded22, and his successor, Halleck, saw things differently. "Hereafter," he commanded, "no slaves should be allowed to come into your lines at all; if any come without your knowledge, when owners call for them deliver them." Such a policy was difficult to enforce; some of the black refugees declared themselves freemen, others showed that their masters had deserted23 them, and still others were captured with forts and plantations24. Evidently, too, slaves were a source of strength to the Confederacy, and were being used as laborers26 and producers. "They constitute a military resource," wrote Secretary Cameron, late in 1861; "and being such, that they should not be turned over to the enemy is too plain to discuss." So gradually the tone of the army chiefs changed; Congress forbade the rendition of fugitives, and Butler's "contrabands" were welcomed as military laborers. This complicated rather than solved the problem, for now the scattering28 fugitives became a steady stream, which flowed faster as the armies marched.
Then the long-headed man with care-chiselled face who sat in the White House saw the inevitable29, and emancipated30 the slaves of rebels on New Year's, 1863. A month later Congress called earnestly for the Negro soldiers whom the act of July, 1862, had half grudgingly31 allowed to enlist32. Thus the barriers were levelled and the deed was done. The stream of fugitives swelled33 to a flood, and anxious army officers kept inquiring: "What must be done with slaves, arriving almost daily? Are we to find food and shelter for women and children?"
It was a Pierce of Boston who pointed34 out the way, and thus became in a sense the founder35 of the Freedmen's Bureau. He was a firm friend of Secretary Chase; and when, in 1861, the care of slaves and abandoned lands devolved upon the Treasury36 officials, Pierce was specially37 detailed38 from the ranks to study the conditions. First, he cared for the refugees at Fortress39 Monroe; and then, after Sherman had captured Hilton Head, Pierce was sent there to found his Port Royal experiment of making free workingmen out of slaves. Before his experiment was barely started, however, the problem of the fugitives had assumed such proportions that it was taken from the hands of the over-burdened Treasury Department and given to the army officials. Already centres of massed freedmen were forming at Fortress Monroe, Washington, New Orleans, Vicksburg and Corinth, Columbus, Ky., and Cairo, Ill., as well as at Port Royal. Army chaplains found here new and fruitful fields; "superintendents41 of contrabands" multiplied, and some attempt at systematic42 work was made by enlisting43 the able-bodied men and giving work to the others.
Then came the Freedmen's Aid societies, born of the touching44 appeals from Pierce and from these other centres of distress. There was the American Missionary45 Association, sprung from the Amistad, and now full-grown for work; the various church organizations, the National Freedmen's Relief Association, the American Freedmen's union, the Western Freedmen's Aid Commission,—in all fifty or more active organizations, which sent clothes, money, school-books, and teachers southward. All they did was needed, for the destitution47 of the freedmen was often reported as "too appalling48 for belief," and the situation was daily growing worse rather than better.
And daily, too, it seemed more plain that this was no ordinary matter of temporary relief, but a national crisis; for here loomed49 a labor27 problem of vast dimensions. Masses of Negroes stood idle, or, if they worked spasmodically, were never sure of pay; and if perchance they received pay, squandered50 the new thing thoughtlessly. In these and other ways were camp-life and the new liberty demoralizing the freedmen. The broader economic organization thus clearly demanded sprang up here and there as accident and local conditions determined51. Here it was that Pierce's Port Royal plan of leased plantations and guided workmen pointed out the rough way. In Washington the military governor, at the urgent appeal of the superintendent40, opened confiscated52 estates to the cultivation53 of the fugitives, and there in the shadow of the dome54 gathered black farm villages. General Dix gave over estates to the freedmen of Fortress Monroe, and so on, South and West. The government and benevolent55 societies furnished the means of cultivation, and the Negro turned again slowly to work. The systems of control, thus started, rapidly grew, here and there, into strange little governments, like that of General Banks in Louisiana, with its ninety thousand black subjects, its fifty thousand guided laborers, and its annual budget of one hundred thousand dollars and more. It made out four thousand pay-rolls a year, registered all freedmen, inquired into grievances56 and redressed57 them, laid and collected taxes, and established a system of public schools. So, too, Colonel Eaton, the superintendent of Tennessee and Arkansas, ruled over one hundred thousand freedmen, leased and cultivated seven thousand acres of cotton land, and fed ten thousand paupers58 a year. In South Carolina was General Saxton, with his deep interest in black folk. He succeeded Pierce and the Treasury officials, and sold forfeited59 estates, leased abandoned plantations, encouraged schools, and received from Sherman, after that terribly picturesque60 march to the sea, thousands of the wretched camp followers61.
Three characteristic things one might have seen in Sherman's raid through Georgia, which threw the new situation in shadowy relief: the Conqueror62, the Conquered, and the Negro. Some see all significance in the grim front of the destroyer, and some in the bitter sufferers of the Lost Cause. But to me neither soldier nor fugitive speaks with so deep a meaning as that dark human cloud that clung like remorse63 on the rear of those swift columns, swelling64 at times to half their size, almost engulfing65 and choking them. In vain were they ordered back, in vain were bridges hewn from beneath their feet; on they trudged67 and writhed68 and surged, until they rolled into Savannah, a starved and naked horde of tens of thousands. There too came the characteristic military remedy: "The islands from Charleston south, the abandoned rice-fields along the rivers for thirty miles back from the sea, and the country bordering the St. John's River, Florida, are reserved and set apart for the settlement of Negroes now made free by act of war." So read the celebrated69 "Field-order Number Fifteen."
All these experiments, orders, and systems were bound to attract and perplex the government and the nation. Directly after the Emancipation Proclamation, Representative Eliot had introduced a bill creating a Bureau of Emancipation; but it was never reported. The following June a committee of inquiry70, appointed by the Secretary of War, reported in favor of a temporary bureau for the "improvement, protection, and employment of refugee freedmen," on much the same lines as were afterwards followed. Petitions came in to President Lincoln from distinguished73 citizens and organizations, strongly urging a comprehensive and unified74 plan of dealing75 with the freedmen, under a bureau which should be "charged with the study of plans and execution of measures for easily guiding, and in every way judiciously76 and humanely77 aiding, the passage of our emancipated and yet to be emancipated blacks from the old condition of forced labor to their new state of voluntary industry."
Some half-hearted steps were taken to accomplish this, in part, by putting the whole matter again in charge of the special Treasury agents. Laws of 1863 and 1864 directed them to take charge of and lease abandoned lands for periods not exceeding twelve months, and to "provide in such leases, or otherwise, for the employment and general welfare" of the freedmen. Most of the army officers greeted this as a welcome relief from perplexing "Negro affairs," and Secretary Fessenden, July 29, 1864, issued an excellent system of regulations, which were afterward71 closely followed by General Howard. Under Treasury agents, large quantities of land were leased in the Mississippi Valley, and many Negroes were employed; but in August, 1864, the new regulations were suspended for reasons of "public policy," and the army was again in control.
Meanwhile Congress had turned its attention to the subject; and in March the House passed a bill by a majority of two establishing a Bureau for Freedmen in the War Department. Charles Sumner, who had charge of the bill in the Senate, argued that freedmen and abandoned lands ought to be under the same department, and reported a substitute for the House bill attaching the Bureau to the Treasury Department. This bill passed, but too late for action by the House. The debates wandered over the whole policy of the administration and the general question of slavery, without touching very closely the specific merits of the measure in hand. Then the national election took place; and the administration, with a vote of renewed confidence from the country, addressed itself to the matter more seriously. A conference between the two branches of Congress agreed upon a carefully drawn78 measure which contained the chief provisions of Sumner's bill, but made the proposed organization a department independent of both the War and the Treasury officials. The bill was conservative, giving the new department "general superintendence of all freedmen." Its purpose was to "establish regulations" for them, protect them, lease them lands, adjust their wages, and appear in civil and military courts as their "next friend." There were many limitations attached to the powers thus granted, and the organization was made permanent. Nevertheless, the Senate defeated the bill, and a new conference committee was appointed. This committee reported a new bill, February 28, which was whirled through just as the session closed, and became the act of 1865 establishing in the War Department a "Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands."
This last compromise was a hasty bit of legislation, vague and uncertain in outline. A Bureau was created, "to continue during the present War of Rebellion, and for one year thereafter," to which was given "the supervision79 and management of all abandoned lands and the control of all subjects relating to refugees and freedmen," under "such rules and regulations as may be presented by the head of the Bureau and approved by the President." A Commissioner80, appointed by the President and Senate, was to control the Bureau, with an office force not exceeding ten clerks. The President might also appoint assistant commissioners81 in the seceded82 States, and to all these offices military officials might be detailed at regular pay. The Secretary of War could issue rations83, clothing, and fuel to the destitute84, and all abandoned property was placed in the hands of the Bureau for eventual85 lease and sale to ex-slaves in forty-acre parcels.
Thus did the United States government definitely assume charge of the emancipated Negro as the ward46 of the nation. It was a tremendous undertaking86. Here at a stroke of the pen was erected87 a government of millions of men,—and not ordinary men either, but black men emasculated by a peculiarly complete system of slavery, centuries old; and now, suddenly, violently, they come into a new birthright, at a time of war and passion, in the midst of the stricken and embittered89 population of their former masters. Any man might well have hesitated to assume charge of such a work, with vast responsibilities, indefinite powers, and limited resources. Probably no one but a soldier would have answered such a call promptly90; and, indeed, no one but a soldier could be called, for Congress had appropriated no money for salaries and expenses.
Less than a month after the weary Emancipator91 passed to his rest, his successor assigned Major-Gen. Oliver O. Howard to duty as Commissioner of the new Bureau. He was a Maine man, then only thirty-five years of age. He had marched with Sherman to the sea, had fought well at Gettysburg, and but the year before had been assigned to the command of the Department of Tennessee. An honest man, with too much faith in human nature, little aptitude92 for business and intricate detail, he had had large opportunity of becoming acquainted at first hand with much of the work before him. And of that work it has been truly said that "no approximately correct history of civilization can ever be written which does not throw out in bold relief, as one of the great landmarks93 of political and social progress, the organization and administration of the Freedmen's Bureau."
On May 12, 1865, Howard was appointed; and he assumed the duties of his office promptly on the 15th, and began examining the field of work. A curious mess he looked upon: little despotisms, communistic experiments, slavery, peonage, business speculations95, organized charity, unorganized almsgiving,—all reeling on under the guise6 of helping97 the freedmen, and all enshrined in the smoke and blood of the war and the cursing and silence of angry men. On May 19 the new government—for a government it really was—issued its constitution; commissioners were to be appointed in each of the seceded states, who were to take charge of "all subjects relating to refugees and freedmen," and all relief and rations were to be given by their consent alone. The Bureau invited continued cooperation with benevolent societies, and declared: "It will be the object of all commissioners to introduce practicable systems of compensated98 labor," and to establish schools. Forthwith nine assistant commissioners were appointed. They were to hasten to their fields of work; seek gradually to close relief establishments, and make the destitute self-supporting; act as courts of law where there were no courts, or where Negroes were not recognized in them as free; establish the institution of marriage among ex-slaves, and keep records; see that freedmen were free to choose their employers, and help in making fair contracts for them; and finally, the circular said: "Simple good faith, for which we hope on all hands for those concerned in the passing away of slavery, will especially relieve the assistant commissioners in the discharge of their duties toward the freedmen, as well as promote the general welfare."
No sooner was the work thus started, and the general system and local organization in some measure begun, than two grave difficulties appeared which changed largely the theory and outcome of Bureau work. First, there were the abandoned lands of the South. It had long been the more or less definitely expressed theory of the North that all the chief problems of Emancipation might be settled by establishing the slaves on the forfeited lands of their masters,—a sort of poetic99 justice, said some. But this poetry done into solemn prose meant either wholesale100 confiscation101 of private property in the South, or vast appropriations102. Now Congress had not appropriated a cent, and no sooner did the proclamations of general amnesty appear than the eight hundred thousand acres of abandoned lands in the hands of the Freedmen's Bureau melted quickly away. The second difficulty lay in perfecting the local organization of the Bureau throughout the wide field of work. Making a new machine and sending out officials of duly ascertained103 fitness for a great work of social reform is no child's task; but this task was even harder, for a new central organization had to be fitted on a heterogeneous104 and confused but already existing system of relief and control of ex-slaves; and the agents available for this work must be sought for in an army still busy with war operations,—men in the very nature of the case ill fitted for delicate social work,—or among the questionable105 camp followers of an invading host. Thus, after a year's work, vigorously as it was pushed, the problem looked even more difficult to grasp and solve than at the beginning. Nevertheless, three things that year's work did, well worth the doing: it relieved a vast amount of physical suffering; it transported seven thousand fugitives from congested centres back to the farm; and, best of all, it inaugurated the crusade of the New England schoolma'am.
The annals of this Ninth Crusade are yet to be written,—the tale of a mission that seemed to our age far more quixotic than the quest of St. Louis seemed to his. Behind the mists of ruin and rapine waved the calico dresses of women who dared, and after the hoarse106 mouthings of the field guns rang the rhythm of the alphabet. Rich and poor they were, serious and curious. Bereaved107 now of a father, now of a brother, now of more than these, they came seeking a life work in planting New England schoolhouses among the white and black of the South. They did their work well. In that first year they taught one hundred thousand souls, and more.
Evidently, Congress must soon legislate108 again on the hastily organized Bureau, which had so quickly grown into wide significance and vast possibilities. An institution such as that was well-nigh as difficult to end as to begin. Early in 1866 Congress took up the matter, when Senator Trumbull, of Illinois, introduced a bill to extend the Bureau and enlarge its powers. This measure received, at the hands of Congress, far more thorough discussion and attention than its predecessor109. The war cloud had thinned enough to allow a clearer conception of the work of Emancipation. The champions of the bill argued that the strengthening of the Freedmen's Bureau was still a military necessity; that it was needed for the proper carrying out of the Thirteenth Amendment11, and was a work of sheer justice to the ex-slave, at a trifling110 cost to the government. The opponents of the measure declared that the war was over, and the necessity for war measures past; that the Bureau, by reason of its extraordinary powers, was clearly unconstitutional in time of peace, and was destined111 to irritate the South and pauperize112 the freedmen, at a final cost of possibly hundreds of millions. These two arguments were unanswered, and indeed unanswerable: the one that the extraordinary powers of the Bureau threatened the civil rights of all citizens; and the other that the government must have power to do what manifestly must be done, and that present abandonment of the freedmen meant their practical reenslavement. The bill which finally passed enlarged and made permanent the Freedmen's Bureau. It was promptly vetoed by President Johnson as "unconstitutional," "unnecessary," and "extrajudicial," and failed of passage over the veto. Meantime, however, the breach114 between Congress and the President began to broaden, and a modified form of the lost bill was finally passed over the President's second veto, July 16.
The act of 1866 gave the Freedmen's Bureau its final form,—the form by which it will be known to posterity115 and judged of men. It extended the existence of the Bureau to July, 1868; it authorized116 additional assistant commissioners, the retention117 of army officers mustered118 out of regular service, the sale of certain forfeited lands to freedmen on nominal119 terms, the sale of Confederate public property for Negro schools, and a wider field of judicial113 interpretation120 and cognizance. The government of the unreconstructed South was thus put very largely in the hands of the Freedmen's Bureau, especially as in many cases the departmental military commander was now made also assistant commissioner. It was thus that the Freedmen's Bureau became a full-fledged government of men. It made laws, executed them and interpreted them; it laid and collected taxes, defined and punished crime, maintained and used military force, and dictated121 such measures as it thought necessary and proper for the accomplishment122 of its varied123 ends. Naturally, all these powers were not exercised continuously nor to their fullest extent; and yet, as General Howard has said, "scarcely any subject that has to be legislated124 upon in civil society failed, at one time or another, to demand the action of this singular Bureau."
To understand and criticise125 intelligently so vast a work, one must not forget an instant the drift of things in the later sixties. Lee had surrendered, Lincoln was dead, and Johnson and Congress were at loggerheads; the Thirteenth Amendment was adopted, the Fourteenth pending126, and the Fifteenth declared in force in 1870. Guerrilla raiding, the ever-present flickering after-flame of war, was spending its forces against the Negroes, and all the Southern land was awakening127 as from some wild dream to poverty and social revolution. In a time of perfect calm, amid willing neighbors and streaming wealth, the social uplifting of four million slaves to an assured and self-sustaining place in the body politic94 and economic would have been a herculean task; but when to the inherent difficulties of so delicate and nice a social operation were added the spite and hate of conflict, the hell of war; when suspicion and cruelty were rife128, and gaunt Hunger wept beside Bereavement,—in such a case, the work of any instrument of social regeneration was in large part foredoomed to failure. The very name of the Bureau stood for a thing in the South which for two centuries and better men had refused even to argue,—that life amid free Negroes was simply unthinkable, the maddest of experiments.
The agents that the Bureau could command varied all the way from unselfish philanthropists to narrow-minded busybodies and thieves; and even though it be true that the average was far better than the worst, it was the occasional fly that helped spoil the ointment129.
Then amid all crouched130 the freed slave, bewildered between friend and foe131. He had emerged from slavery,—not the worst slavery in the world, not a slavery that made all life unbearable132, rather a slavery that had here and there something of kindliness133, fidelity134, and happiness,—but withal slavery, which, so far as human aspiration135 and desert were concerned, classed the black man and the ox together. And the Negro knew full well that, whatever their deeper convictions may have been, Southern men had fought with desperate energy to perpetuate136 this slavery under which the black masses, with half-articulate thought, had writhed and shivered. They welcomed freedom with a cry. They shrank from the master who still strove for their chains; they fled to the friends that had freed them, even though those friends stood ready to use them as a club for driving the recalcitrant137 South back into loyalty138. So the cleft139 between the white and black South grew. Idle to say it never should have been; it was as inevitable as its results were pitiable. Curiously140 incongruous elements were left arrayed against each other,—the North, the government, the carpet-bagger, and the slave, here; and there, all the South that was white, whether gentleman or vagabond, honest man or rascal141, lawless murderer or martyr142 to duty.
Thus it is doubly difficult to write of this period calmly, so intense was the feeling, so mighty143 the human passions that swayed and blinded men. Amid it all, two figures ever stand to typify that day to coming ages,—the one, a gray-haired gentleman, whose fathers had quit themselves like men, whose sons lay in nameless graves; who bowed to the evil of slavery because its abolition144 threatened untold145 ill to all; who stood at last, in the evening of life, a blighted146, ruined form, with hate in his eyes;—and the other, a form hovering147 dark and mother-like, her awful face black with the mists of centuries, had aforetime quailed148 at that white master's command, had bent149 in love over the cradles of his sons and daughters, and closed in death the sunken eyes of his wife,—aye, too, at his behest had laid herself low to his lust150, and borne a tawny151 man-child to the world, only to see her dark boy's limbs scattered152 to the winds by midnight marauders riding after "damned Niggers." These were the saddest sights of that woful day; and no man clasped the hands of these two passing figures of the present-past; but, hating, they went to their long home, and, hating, their children's children live today.
Here, then, was the field of work for the Freedmen's Bureau; and since, with some hesitation153, it was continued by the act of 1868 until 1869, let us look upon four years of its work as a whole. There were, in 1868, nine hundred Bureau officials scattered from Washington to Texas, ruling, directly and indirectly154, many millions of men. The deeds of these rulers fall mainly under seven heads: the relief of physical suffering, the overseeing of the beginnings of free labor, the buying and selling of land, the establishment of schools, the paying of bounties155, the administration of justice, and the financiering of all these activities.
Up to June, 1869, over half a million patients had been treated by Bureau physicians and surgeons, and sixty hospitals and asylums156 had been in operation. In fifty months twenty-one million free rations were distributed at a cost of over four million dollars. Next came the difficult question of labor. First, thirty thousand black men were transported from the refuges and relief stations back to the farms, back to the critical trial of a new way of working. Plain instructions went out from Washington: the laborers must be free to choose their employers, no fixed rate of wages was prescribed, and there was to be no peonage or forced labor. So far, so good; but where local agents differed toto caelo in capacity and character, where the personnel was continually changing, the outcome was necessarily varied. The largest element of success lay in the fact that the majority of the freedmen were willing, even eager, to work. So labor contracts were written,—fifty thousand in a single State,—laborers advised, wages guaranteed, and employers supplied. In truth, the organization became a vast labor bureau,—not perfect, indeed, notably157 defective158 here and there, but on the whole successful beyond the dreams of thoughtful men. The two great obstacles which confronted the officials were the tyrant159 and the idler,—the slaveholder who was determined to perpetuate slavery under another name; and, the freedman who regarded freedom as perpetual rest,—the Devil and the Deep Sea.
In the work of establishing the Negroes as peasant proprietors160, the Bureau was from the first handicapped and at last absolutely checked. Something was done, and larger things were planned; abandoned lands were leased so long as they remained in the hands of the Bureau, and a total revenue of nearly half a million dollars derived161 from black tenants162. Some other lands to which the nation had gained title were sold on easy terms, and public lands were opened for settlement to the very few freedmen who had tools and capital. But the vision of "forty acres and a mule"—the righteous and reasonable ambition to become a landholder, which the nation had all but categorically promised the freedmen—was destined in most cases to bitter disappointment. And those men of marvellous hindsight who are today seeking to preach the Negro back to the present peonage of the soil know well, or ought to know, that the opportunity of binding163 the Negro peasant willingly to the soil was lost on that day when the Commissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau had to go to South Carolina and tell the weeping freedmen, after their years of toil164, that their land was not theirs, that there was a mistake—somewhere. If by 1874 the Georgia Negro alone owned three hundred and fifty thousand acres of land, it was by grace of his thrift165 rather than by bounty166 of the government.
The greatest success of the Freedmen's Bureau lay in the planting of the free school among Negroes, and the idea of free elementary education among all classes in the South. It not only called the school-mistresses through the benevolent agencies and built them schoolhouses, but it helped discover and support such apostles of human culture as Edmund Ware167, Samuel Armstrong, and Erastus Cravath. The opposition168 to Negro education in the South was at first bitter, and showed itself in ashes, insult, and blood; for the South believed an educated Negro to be a dangerous Negro. And the South was not wholly wrong; for education among all kinds of men always has had, and always will have, an element of danger and revolution, of dissatisfaction and discontent. Nevertheless, men strive to know. Perhaps some inkling of this paradox169, even in the unquiet days of the Bureau, helped the bayonets allay170 an opposition to human training which still to-day lies smouldering in the South, but not flaming. Fisk, Atlanta, Howard, and Hampton were founded in these days, and six million dollars were expended171 for educational work, seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars of which the freedmen themselves gave of their poverty.
Such contributions, together with the buying of land and various other enterprises, showed that the ex-slave was handling some free capital already. The chief initial source of this was labor in the army, and his pay and bounty as a soldier. Payments to Negro soldiers were at first complicated by the ignorance of the recipients172, and the fact that the quotas173 of colored regiments174 from Northern States were largely filled by recruits from the South, unknown to their fellow soldiers. Consequently, payments were accompanied by such frauds that Congress, by joint175 resolution in 1867, put the whole matter in the hands of the Freedmen's Bureau. In two years six million dollars was thus distributed to five thousand claimants, and in the end the sum exceeded eight million dollars. Even in this system fraud was frequent; but still the work put needed capital in the hands of practical paupers, and some, at least, was well spent.
The most perplexing and least successful part of the Bureau's work lay in the exercise of its judicial functions. The regular Bureau court consisted of one representative of the employer, one of the Negro, and one of the Bureau. If the Bureau could have maintained a perfectly176 judicial attitude, this arrangement would have been ideal, and must in time have gained confidence; but the nature of its other activities and the character of its personnel prejudiced the Bureau in favor of the black litigants177, and led without doubt to much injustice178 and annoyance179. On the other hand, to leave the Negro in the hands of Southern courts was impossible. In a distracted land where slavery had hardly fallen, to keep the strong from wanton abuse of the weak, and the weak from gloating insolently180 over the half-shorn strength of the strong, was a thankless, hopeless task. The former masters of the land were peremptorily181 ordered about, seized, and imprisoned182, and punished over and again, with scant183 courtesy from army officers. The former slaves were intimidated184, beaten, raped185, and butchered by angry and revengeful men. Bureau courts tended to become centres simply for punishing whites, while the regular civil courts tended to become solely186 institutions for perpetuating187 the slavery of blacks. Almost every law and method ingenuity188 could devise was employed by the legislatures to reduce the Negroes to serfdom,—to make them the slaves of the State, if not of individual owners; while the Bureau officials too often were found striving to put the "bottom rail on top," and gave the freedmen a power and independence which they could not yet use. It is all well enough for us of another generation to wax wise with advice to those who bore the burden in the heat of the day. It is full easy now to see that the man who lost home, fortune, and family at a stroke, and saw his land ruled by "mules189 and niggers," was really benefited by the passing of slavery. It is not difficult now to say to the young freedman, cheated and cuffed190 about who has seen his father's head beaten to a jelly and his own mother namelessly assaulted, that the meek191 shall inherit the earth. Above all, nothing is more convenient than to heap on the Freedmen's Bureau all the evils of that evil day, and damn it utterly192 for every mistake and blunder that was made.
All this is easy, but it is neither sensible nor just. Someone had blundered, but that was long before Oliver Howard was born; there was criminal aggression193 and heedless neglect, but without some system of control there would have been far more than there was. Had that control been from within, the Negro would have been re-enslaved, to all intents and purposes. Coming as the control did from without, perfect men and methods would have bettered all things; and even with imperfect agents and questionable methods, the work accomplished194 was not undeserving of commendation.
uch was the dawn of Freedom; such was the work of the
Freedmen's Bureau, which, summed up in brief, may be epitomized thus: for some fifteen million dollars, beside the sums spent before 1865, and the dole195 of benevolent societies, this Bureau set going a system of free labor, established a beginning of peasant proprietorship196, secured the recognition of black freedmen before courts of law, and founded the free common school in the South. On the other hand, it failed to begin the establishment of good-will between ex-masters and freedmen, to guard its work wholly from paternalistic methods which discouraged self-reliance, and to carry out to any considerable extent its implied promises to furnish the freedmen with land. Its successes were the result of hard work, supplemented by the aid of philanthropists and the eager striving of black men. Its failures were the result of bad local agents, the inherent difficulties of the work, and national neglect.
Such an institution, from its wide powers, great responsibilities, large control of moneys, and generally conspicuous197 position, was naturally open to repeated and bitter attack. It sustained a searching Congressional investigation198 at the instance of Fernando Wood in 1870. Its archives and few remaining functions were with blunt discourtesy transferred from Howard's control, in his absence, to the supervision of Secretary of War Belknap in 1872, on the Secretary's recommendation. Finally, in consequence of grave intimations of wrong-doing made by the Secretary and his subordinates, General Howard was court-martialed in 1874. In both of these trials the Commissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau was officially exonerated199 from any wilful200 misdoing, and his work commended. Nevertheless, many unpleasant things were brought to light,—the methods of transacting201 the business of the Bureau were faulty; several cases of defalcation202 were proved, and other frauds strongly suspected; there were some business transactions which savored203 of dangerous speculation96, if not dishonesty; and around it all lay the smirch of the Freedmen's Bank.
Morally and practically, the Freedmen's Bank was part of the Freedmen's Bureau, although it had no legal connection with it. With the prestige of the government back of it, and a directing board of unusual respectability and national reputation, this banking204 institution had made a remarkable205 start in the development of that thrift among black folk which slavery had kept them from knowing. Then in one sad day came the crash,—all the hard-earned dollars of the freedmen disappeared; but that was the least of the loss,—all the faith in saving went too, and much of the faith in men; and that was a loss that a Nation which to-day sneers206 at Negro shiftlessness has never yet made good. Not even ten additional years of slavery could have done so much to throttle207 the thrift of the freedmen as the mismanagement and bankruptcy208 of the series of savings209 banks chartered by the Nation for their especial aid. Where all the blame should rest, it is hard to say; whether the Bureau and the Bank died chiefly by reason of the blows of its selfish friends or the dark machinations of its foes210, perhaps even time will never reveal, for here lies unwritten history.
Of the foes without the Bureau, the bitterest were those who attacked not so much its conduct or policy under the law as the necessity for any such institution at all. Such attacks came primarily from the Border States and the South; and they were summed up by Senator Davis, of Kentucky, when he moved to entitle the act of 1866 a bill "to promote strife211 and conflict between the white and black races … by a grant of unconstitutional power." The argument gathered tremendous strength South and North; but its very strength was its weakness. For, argued the plain common-sense of the nation, if it is unconstitutional, unpractical, and futile212 for the nation to stand guardian213 over its helpless wards72, then there is left but one alternative,—to make those wards their own guardians214 by arming them with the ballot215. Moreover, the path of the practical politician pointed the same way; for, argued this opportunist, if we cannot peacefully reconstruct the South with white votes, we certainly can with black votes. So justice and force joined hands.
The alternative thus offered the nation was not between full and restricted Negro suffrage216; else every sensible man, black and white, would easily have chosen the latter. It was rather a choice between suffrage and slavery, after endless blood and gold had flowed to sweep human bondage217 away. Not a single Southern legislature stood ready to admit a Negro, under any conditions, to the polls; not a single Southern legislature believed free Negro labor was possible without a system of restrictions218 that took all its freedom away; there was scarcely a white man in the South who did not honestly regard Emancipation as a crime, and its practical nullification as a duty. In such a situation, the granting of the ballot to the black man was a necessity, the very least a guilty nation could grant a wronged race, and the only method of compelling the South to accept the results of the war. Thus Negro suffrage ended a civil war by beginning a race feud219. And some felt gratitude220 toward the race thus sacrificed in its swaddling clothes on the altar of national integrity; and some felt and feel only indifference221 and contempt.
Had political exigencies222 been less pressing, the opposition to government guardianship223 of Negroes less bitter, and the attachment224 to the slave system less strong, the social seer can well imagine a far better policy,—a permanent Freedmen's Bureau, with a national system of Negro schools; a carefully supervised employment and labor office; a system of impartial225 protection before the regular courts; and such institutions for social betterment as savings-banks, land and building associations, and social settlements. All this vast expenditure226 of money and brains might have formed a great school of prospective227 citizenship228, and solved in a way we have not yet solved the most perplexing and persistent229 of the Negro problems.
That such an institution was unthinkable in 1870 was due in part to certain acts of the Freedmen's Bureau itself. It came to regard its work as merely temporary, and Negro suffrage as a final answer to all present perplexities. The political ambition of many of its agents and proteges led it far afield into questionable activities, until the South, nursing its own deep prejudices, came easily to ignore all the good deeds of the Bureau and hate its very name with perfect hatred230. So the Freedmen's Bureau died, and its child was the Fifteenth Amendment.
The passing of a great human institution before its work is done, like the untimely passing of a single soul, but leaves a legacy231 of striving for other men. The legacy of the Freedmen's Bureau is the heavy heritage of this generation. To-day, when new and vaster problems are destined to strain every fibre of the national mind and soul, would it not be well to count this legacy honestly and carefully? For this much all men know: despite compromise, war, and struggle, the Negro is not free. In the backwoods of the Gulf66 States, for miles and miles, he may not leave the plantation25 of his birth; in well-nigh the whole rural South the black farmers are peons, bound by law and custom to an economic slavery, from which the only escape is death or the penitentiary232. In the most cultured sections and cities of the South the Negroes are a segregated233 servile caste, with restricted rights and privileges. Before the courts, both in law and custom, they stand on a different and peculiar88 basis. Taxation234 without representation is the rule of their political life. And the result of all this is, and in nature must have been, lawlessness and crime. That is the large legacy of the Freedmen's Bureau, the work it did not do because it could not.
I have seen a land right merry with the sun, where children sing, and rolling hills lie like passioned women wanton with harvest. And there in the King's Highways sat and sits a figure veiled and bowed, by which the traveller's footsteps hasten as they go. On the tainted235 air broods fear. Three centuries' thought has been the raising and unveiling of that bowed human heart, and now behold236 a century new for the duty and the deed. The problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line.
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1
avenger
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| n. 复仇者 | |
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lighter
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| n.打火机，点火器；驳船；v.用驳船运送；light的比较级 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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shibboleth
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| n.陈规陋习；口令；暗语 | |
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guised
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| v.外观，伪装( guise的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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guise
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| n.外表，伪装的姿态 | |
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peremptory
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| adj.紧急的，专横的，断然的 | |
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query
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| n.疑问，问号，质问；vt.询问，表示怀疑 | |
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emancipation
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| n.（从束缚、支配下）解放 | |
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intensify
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| vt.加强；变强；加剧 | |
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amendment
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| n.改正，修正，改善，修正案 | |
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amendments
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| （法律、文件的）改动( amendment的名词复数 )； 修正案； 修改； （美国宪法的）修正案 | |
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naught
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| n.无，零 [=nought] | |
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penetrated
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| adj. 击穿的，鞭辟入里的 动词penetrate的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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fugitive
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| adj.逃亡的，易逝的；n.逃犯，逃亡者 | |
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flickering
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| adj.闪烁的，摇曳的，一闪一闪的 | |
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horde
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| n.群众，一大群 | |
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distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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contraband
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| n.违禁品，走私品 | |
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fugitives
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| n.亡命者，逃命者( fugitive的名词复数 ) | |
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martial
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| adj.战争的，军事的，尚武的，威武的 | |
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countermanded
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| v.取消（命令），撤回( countermand的过去分词 ) | |
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deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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plantations
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| n.种植园，大农场( plantation的名词复数 ) | |
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plantation
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| n.种植园，大农场 | |
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laborers
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| n.体力劳动者，工人( laborer的名词复数 )；（熟练工人的）辅助工 | |
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labor
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| n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦 | |
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scattering
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| n.[物]散射；散乱，分散；在媒介质中的散播adj.散乱的；分散在不同范围的；广泛扩散的；（选票）数量分散的v.散射(scatter的ing形式)；散布；驱散 | |
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inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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emancipated
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| adj.被解放的，不受约束的v.解放某人（尤指摆脱政治、法律或社会的束缚）( emancipate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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grudgingly
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enlist
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| vt.谋取(支持等)，赢得；征募；vi.入伍 | |
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swelled
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| 增强( swell的过去式和过去分词 )； 肿胀； （使）凸出； 充满（激情） | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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Founder
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| n.创始者，缔造者 | |
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treasury
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| n.宝库；国库，金库；文库 | |
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specially
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| adv.特定地；特殊地；明确地 | |
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detailed
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| adj.详细的，详尽的，极注意细节的，完全的 | |
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fortress
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| n.堡垒，防御工事 | |
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superintendent
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| n.监督人，主管，总监；(英国)警务长 | |
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superintendents
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| 警长( superintendent的名词复数 )； （大楼的）管理人； 监管人； （美国）警察局长 | |
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systematic
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| adj.有系统的，有计划的，有方法的 | |
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enlisting
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| v.（使）入伍， （使）参军( enlist的现在分词 )；获得（帮助或支持） | |
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touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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missionary
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| adj.教会的，传教(士)的；n.传教士 | |
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ward
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| n.守卫，监护，病房，行政区，由监护人或法院保护的人（尤指儿童）；vt.守护，躲开 | |
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destitution
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| n.穷困，缺乏，贫穷 | |
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appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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loomed
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| v.隐约出现，阴森地逼近( loom的过去式和过去分词 )；隐约出现，阴森地逼近 | |
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squandered
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| v.（指钱，财产等）浪费，乱花( squander的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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confiscated
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| 没收，充公( confiscate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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cultivation
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| n.耕作，培养，栽培（法），养成 | |
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dome
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| n.圆屋顶，拱顶 | |
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benevolent
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| adj.仁慈的，乐善好施的 | |
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grievances
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| n.委屈( grievance的名词复数 )；苦衷；不满；牢骚 | |
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redressed
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| v.改正( redress的过去式和过去分词 )；重加权衡；恢复平衡 | |
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paupers
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| n.穷人( pauper的名词复数 )；贫民；贫穷 | |
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forfeited
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| （因违反协议、犯规、受罚等）丧失，失去( forfeit的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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followers
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| 追随者( follower的名词复数 )； 用户； 契据的附面； 从动件 | |
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conqueror
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| n.征服者，胜利者 | |
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remorse
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| n.痛恨，悔恨，自责 | |
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swelling
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| n.肿胀 | |
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engulfing
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| adj.吞噬的v.吞没，包住( engulf的现在分词 ) | |
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gulf
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| n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂 | |
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trudged
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| vt.& vi.跋涉，吃力地走（trudge的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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writhed
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| （因极度痛苦而）扭动或翻滚( writhe的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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celebrated
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| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
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inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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wards
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| 区( ward的名词复数 )； 病房； 受监护的未成年者； 被人照顾或控制的状态 | |
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distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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unified
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| (unify 的过去式和过去分词)； 统一的； 统一标准的； 一元化的 | |
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dealing
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| n.经商方法，待人态度 | |
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judiciously
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| adv.明断地，明智而审慎地 | |
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humanely
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| adv.仁慈地；人道地；富人情地；慈悲地 | |
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drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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supervision
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| n.监督，管理 | |
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commissioner
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| n.（政府厅、局、处等部门）专员，长官，委员 | |
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commissioners
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| n.专员( commissioner的名词复数 )；长官；委员；政府部门的长官 | |
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seceded
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| v.脱离，退出( secede的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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rations
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| 定量( ration的名词复数 )； 配给量； 正常量； 合理的量 | |
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destitute
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| adj.缺乏的；穷困的 | |
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eventual
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| adj.最后的，结局的，最终的 | |
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undertaking
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| n.保证，许诺，事业 | |
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ERECTED
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| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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embittered
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| v.使怨恨，激怒( embitter的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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emancipator
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| n.释放者；救星 | |
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aptitude
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| n.(学习方面的)才能，资质，天资 | |
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landmarks
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| n.陆标( landmark的名词复数 )；目标；（标志重要阶段的）里程碑 ~ (in sth)；有历史意义的建筑物（或遗址） | |
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politic
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| adj.有智虑的；精明的；v.从政 | |
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speculations
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| n.投机买卖( speculation的名词复数 )；思考；投机活动；推断 | |
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speculation
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| n.思索，沉思；猜测；投机 | |
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helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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98
compensated
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| 补偿，报酬( compensate的过去式和过去分词 )； 给（某人）赔偿（或赔款） | |
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99
poetic
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| adj.富有诗意的，有诗人气质的，善于抒情的 | |
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100
wholesale
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| n.批发；adv.以批发方式；vt.批发，成批出售 | |
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101
confiscation
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| n. 没收, 充公, 征收 | |
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102
appropriations
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| n.挪用（appropriation的复数形式） | |
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103
ascertained
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| v.弄清，确定，查明( ascertain的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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104
heterogeneous
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| adj.庞杂的；异类的 | |
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105
questionable
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| adj.可疑的，有问题的 | |
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106
hoarse
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| adj.嘶哑的，沙哑的 | |
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107
bereaved
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| adj.刚刚丧失亲人的v.使失去（希望、生命等）( bereave的过去式和过去分词)；（尤指死亡）使丧失（亲人、朋友等）；使孤寂；抢走（财物） | |
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108
legislate
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| vt.制定法律；n.法规，律例；立法 | |
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109
predecessor
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| n.前辈，前任 | |
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110
trifling
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| adj.微不足道的；没什么价值的 | |
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111
destined
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| adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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112
pauperize
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| 贫困化 | |
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113
judicial
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| adj.司法的，法庭的，审判的，明断的，公正的 | |
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114
breach
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| n.违反，不履行；破裂；vt.冲破，攻破 | |
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115
posterity
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| n.后裔，子孙，后代 | |
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116
authorized
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| a.委任的，许可的 | |
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117
retention
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| n.保留，保持，保持力，记忆力 | |
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118
mustered
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| v.集合，召集，集结（尤指部队）( muster的过去式和过去分词 )；（自他人处）搜集某事物；聚集；激发 | |
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119
nominal
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| adj.名义上的；(金额、租金)微不足道的 | |
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120
interpretation
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| n.解释，说明，描述；艺术处理 | |
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121
dictated
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| v.大声讲或读( dictate的过去式和过去分词 )；口授；支配；摆布 | |
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122
accomplishment
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| n.完成，成就，（pl.）造诣，技能 | |
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123
varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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124
legislated
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| v.立法，制定法律( legislate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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125
criticise
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| v.批评，评论；非难 | |
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126
pending
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| prep.直到，等待…期间；adj.待定的；迫近的 | |
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127
awakening
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| n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的 | |
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128
rife
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| adj.(指坏事情)充斥的，流行的，普遍的 | |
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129
ointment
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| n.药膏，油膏，软膏 | |
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130
crouched
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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131
foe
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| n.敌人，仇敌 | |
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132
unbearable
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| adj.不能容忍的；忍受不住的 | |
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133
kindliness
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| n.厚道，亲切，友好的行为 | |
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134
fidelity
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| n.忠诚，忠实；精确 | |
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135
aspiration
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| n.志向，志趣抱负；渴望；(语)送气音；吸出 | |
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136
perpetuate
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| v.使永存，使永记不忘 | |
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137
recalcitrant
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| adj.倔强的 | |
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138
loyalty
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| n.忠诚，忠心 | |
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139
cleft
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| n.裂缝；adj.裂开的 | |
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140
curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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141
rascal
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| n.流氓；不诚实的人 | |
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142
martyr
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| n.烈士，殉难者；vt.杀害，折磨，牺牲 | |
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143
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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144
abolition
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| n.废除，取消 | |
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145
untold
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| adj.数不清的，无数的 | |
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146
blighted
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| adj.枯萎的，摧毁的 | |
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147
hovering
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| 鸟( hover的现在分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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148
quailed
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| 害怕，发抖，畏缩( quail的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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149
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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150
lust
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| n.性(淫)欲；渴(欲)望；vi.对…有强烈的欲望 | |
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151
tawny
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| adj.茶色的，黄褐色的；n.黄褐色 | |
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152
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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153
hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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154
indirectly
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| adv.间接地，不直接了当地 | |
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155
bounties
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| （由政府提供的）奖金( bounty的名词复数 )； 赏金； 慷慨； 大方 | |
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156
asylums
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| n.避难所( asylum的名词复数 )；庇护；政治避难；精神病院 | |
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157
notably
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| adv.值得注意地，显著地，尤其地，特别地 | |
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158
defective
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| adj.有毛病的，有问题的，有瑕疵的 | |
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159
tyrant
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| n.暴君，专制的君主，残暴的人 | |
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160
proprietors
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| n.所有人，业主( proprietor的名词复数 ) | |
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161
derived
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| vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取 | |
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162
tenants
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| n.房客( tenant的名词复数 )；佃户；占用者；占有者 | |
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163
binding
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| 有约束力的，有效的，应遵守的 | |
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164
toil
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| vi.辛劳工作，艰难地行动；n.苦工，难事 | |
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165
thrift
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| adj.节约，节俭；n.节俭，节约 | |
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166
bounty
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| n.慷慨的赠予物，奖金；慷慨，大方；施与 | |
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167
ware
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| n.(常用复数)商品，货物 | |
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168
opposition
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| n.反对，敌对 | |
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169
paradox
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| n.似乎矛盾却正确的说法；自相矛盾的人(物) | |
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170
allay
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| v.消除，减轻(恐惧、怀疑等) | |
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171
expended
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| v.花费( expend的过去式和过去分词 )；使用（钱等）做某事；用光；耗尽 | |
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172
recipients
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| adj.接受的；受领的；容纳的；愿意接受的n.收件人；接受者；受领者；接受器 | |
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173
quotas
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| （正式限定的）定量( quota的名词复数 )； 定额； 指标； 摊派 | |
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174
regiments
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| （军队的）团( regiment的名词复数 )； 大量的人或物 | |
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175
joint
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| adj.联合的，共同的；n.关节，接合处；v.连接，贴合 | |
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176
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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177
litigants
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| n.诉讼当事人( litigant的名词复数 ) | |
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178
injustice
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| n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利 | |
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179
annoyance
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| n.恼怒，生气，烦恼 | |
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180
insolently
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| adv.自豪地，自傲地 | |
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181
peremptorily
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| adv.紧急地，不容分说地，专横地 | |
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182
imprisoned
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| 下狱，监禁( imprison的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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183
scant
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| adj.不充分的，不足的；v.减缩，限制，忽略 | |
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184
intimidated
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| v.恐吓；威胁adj.害怕的；受到威胁的 | |
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185
raped
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| v.以暴力夺取，强夺( rape的过去式和过去分词 )；强奸 | |
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186
solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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187
perpetuating
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| perpetuate的现在进行式 | |
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188
ingenuity
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| n.别出心裁；善于发明创造 | |
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189
mules
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| 骡( mule的名词复数 )； 拖鞋； 顽固的人； 越境运毒者 | |
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190
cuffed
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| v.掌打，拳打( cuff的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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191
meek
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| adj.温顺的，逆来顺受的 | |
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192
utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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193
aggression
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| n.进攻，侵略，侵犯，侵害 | |
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194
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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195
dole
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| n.救济，（失业）救济金；vt.（out）发放，发给 | |
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196
proprietorship
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| n.所有（权）；所有权 | |
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197
conspicuous
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| adj.明眼的，惹人注目的；炫耀的，摆阔气的 | |
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198
investigation
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| n.调查，调查研究 | |
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199
exonerated
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| v.使免罪，免除( exonerate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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200
wilful
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| adj.任性的，故意的 | |
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201
transacting
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| v.办理（业务等）( transact的现在分词 )；交易，谈判 | |
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202
defalcation
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| n.盗用公款，挪用公款，贪污 | |
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203
savored
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| v.意味，带有…的性质( savor的过去式和过去分词 )；给…加调味品；使有风味；品尝 | |
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204
banking
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| n.银行业，银行学，金融业 | |
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205
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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206
sneers
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| 讥笑的表情（言语）( sneer的名词复数 ) | |
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207
throttle
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| n.节流阀，节气阀，喉咙；v.扼喉咙，使窒息，压 | |
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208
bankruptcy
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| n.破产；无偿付能力 | |
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209
savings
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| n.存款，储蓄 | |
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210
foes
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| 敌人，仇敌( foe的名词复数 ) | |
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211
strife
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| n.争吵，冲突，倾轧，竞争 | |
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212
futile
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| adj.无效的，无用的，无希望的 | |
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213
guardian
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| n.监护人；守卫者，保护者 | |
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214
guardians
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| 监护人( guardian的名词复数 )； 保护者，维护者 | |
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215
ballot
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| n.（不记名）投票，投票总数，投票权；vi.投票 | |
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216
suffrage
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| n.投票，选举权，参政权 | |
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217
bondage
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| n.奴役，束缚 | |
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218
restrictions
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| 约束( restriction的名词复数 )； 管制； 制约因素； 带限制性的条件（或规则） | |
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219
feud
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| n.长期不和；世仇；v.长期争斗；世代结仇 | |
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220
gratitude
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| adj.感激，感谢 | |
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221
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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222
exigencies
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| n.急切需要 | |
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223
guardianship
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| n. 监护, 保护, 守护 | |
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224
attachment
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| n.附属物，附件；依恋；依附 | |
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225
impartial
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| adj.(in,to)公正的，无偏见的 | |
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226
expenditure
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| n.(时间、劳力、金钱等)支出；使用，消耗 | |
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227
prospective
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| adj.预期的，未来的，前瞻性的 | |
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228
citizenship
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| n.市民权，公民权，国民的义务(身份) | |
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229
persistent
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| adj.坚持不懈的，执意的；持续的 | |
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230
hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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231
legacy
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| n.遗产，遗赠；先人(或过去)留下的东西 | |
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232
penitentiary
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| n.感化院；监狱 | |
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233
segregated
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| 分开的； 被隔离的 | |
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234
taxation
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| n.征税，税收，税金 | |
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235
tainted
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| adj.腐坏的；污染的；沾污的；感染的v.使变质( taint的过去式和过去分词 )；使污染；败坏；被污染，腐坏，败坏 | |
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236
behold
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| v.看，注视，看到 | |
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