The South Carolina Mechanics Association seeks to halt slave self-hire. Although laws had been enacted against the practice, they declare that the "baneful evil" continues, and the statutes “have become a dead letter." The officers of said association insist that more stringent measures are necessary. They further assert that such legislation would be “eminently conducive to the best interest and prosperity of the State, her Institutions, and her Citizens and to the well being and usefulness of the slave himself." The petitioners also request "that your Honourable body would take into consideration the class of negroes known amongst us as Free negroes and that a tax be imposed upon them or that some other remedy be made that shall at least place us in such a position that we may be able to compete with them, if they are to be on an equality with us."
Result: Referred to committee on colored population.
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Repository: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia, South Carolina