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in Sumter Co.  30 Children
in Green Co.    3 Children

Of the 30 Children apprenticed in Sumter Co, 3 are white.

Hale Co being but recently organized, has as yet apprenticed none.

I believe the several Probate Judges to be conscientious men, and that they only endeavored to carry out the strict letter of the Law in apprenticing so many children.

Hon. Thos. J. Woolf, Probate Judge for Marengo Co closes his reports with these words. "The present apprentice law of Alabama I consider very loose, defective and erroneous in its provisions, and any evils arising under it, should be attributed more to the law, than to those who have been called upon to carry out its provisions, and who were sworn to execute it as it is"

Hon W. C. Oliver, Probate Judge for Green Co, believing portions of the law unconstitutional, and was more inclined to stretch his prerogatives, refusing to apprentice any, unless he was well satisfied, that they were likely to become a public charge. The consequence is, that