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3rd Division.
Mecklenburg County.

[[left margin]] General Condition of Affairs, &c., &c. [[/left margin]]
The freedmen in this county are very poor and dependent, but are — so far as I could see and hear — making most creditable efforts to improve their condition. Most of them are working crops on shares, under stringent contracts, and if the interpretation of and settlement under these contracts is to be had without opportunity for appeal to a Bureau Officer, the anticipation of profit which now stimulates them will be sadly disappointed; for in addition to the necessity (which is almost universal) that they obtain advances of provisions, &c., from their employers to be repaid from their share of crop, thus involving long open accounts, there is such a feeling of hatred against them, that to impose on and defraud them will be looked on as a proper proceeding; and to seek a remedy in the Courts, as at present constituted and conducted, would simply add cost to first loss. Notwithstanding this bitterness — in private conversation — many admit that the freedmen, in Mecklenburg Co., are working better than any year since the surrender. Petty crime is diminishing, as shown by Court docket. The freedmen lack economy, but are becoming aware that they must practice this and transact their own business, if they would become independent. Women are generally aid their husbands in cultivating the crops.

[[left margin]] Civil Justice. [[/left margin]]
With the present Officers and condition of public sentiment, it is impossible for freedmen to obtain full and impartial justice in the Civil Courts. In matters of money the action of Courts and Magistrates is delatory — postponements granted repeatedly — and