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Committee of the House of Delegates, and by other distinguished members, that the act was conceived in no special reference to the freedmen. It was aimed at the white man rather than the poor negro designet to float off the scum which the lashings of the waves of revolution have brought to the surface, to reach the the garotters, burglars, and swindlers, whom the demoralization of war has sent in swarms through the Country and who overrun the Cities.

The military reason for suspending the operation of this law is based upon the totally erroneous idea that advantage would be taken of it to subject the freedman to inadequate rates for labor. There is no disposition on the part of the white people of Virginia to put the negro off with inadequate wages. They are miserably poor now, and cannot pay high cash wages. But they are allowing a fair share of the crops, and when the first crop shall have been made and gathered, they will be able, and interest and humanity will induce them, to allow the amplest compensation.

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