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Speir has threatened to prosecute any person who may hire the said freedmen and consequently the people are afraid to hire them or give them a house to live in and they are now homeless and no place to go to, (the [[strikethrough]] laws [[/strikethrough]] act of the last legislature says that any person who hires interfears or entices any [[stikethrough]] person [[/strikethrough]] labourer to leave their employer who have contracted for one month a year share be fined &c) this is the reason no one will hire them, this same man Speir prosecuted one of his freedmen last summer for pulling three peaches out of his orchard when there were thousands upon thousands of them and and this same court that Tom is to be tried before [[strikethrough]] are the magistrates the [[/strikethrough]] convicted him and had him sold for three months when I see so much manifest injustice my sense of rectitude forbids me to be silent and if the Freedmans beaurough is established for the purpose of seeing that the freedmen have justice I think this is one of the cases that should come specially under the notice I am perhaps the oldest Magistrate in the state of Alabama (in office) I having