Sunday, July 19, 2020 1 the Very Rev. Chris Yaw† St. David's Episcopal

“Weeds and Wheat” Sunday, July 19, 2020 The Very Rev. Chris Yaw† St. David’s Episcopal Church Southfield, MI Lessons: Matthew 13 Did you know that at the time of the Civil War, 7 of the 8 richest U-S states were in the South. Fortunes were made in sugar, tobacco, and cotton - on account of the fertile land, sunshine, and the free labor - of slaves. That ended with the Civil War in 1865 - when the slaves were set free, all 4 million of them, ending the most productive system of non-mechanized cotton production the world had ever known. And consequently, the South’s economy was in shambles. (Nat Sound) This is when a very clever ‘pear-shaped man with a mutton-chop beard' came on the scene. Samuel Lawrence James was a civil engineer, who had built the first street car line in New Orleans. He was a Confederate veteran who led a famous brigade of Irish soldiers during the war. And he was an opportunist who paid close attention to the wording of the newly adopted 13th Amendment which set the slaves free. But James noticed that the Constitution now abolished slavery for everyone, “except as punishment for a crime.” Convict leasing was not a new idea - but it was about to get very popular. James thought: What was to stop him from doing this now - when half of Louisiana’s population was newly liberated - and many of them were jobless. Surely, crime - and the prison population - would soar. Could James get those convicts to work for him? Could he build a plantation empire to put the pre-war slaveholders to shame? Could he corner the market and have more men under his control, still driven by the whip, than anyone in Louisiana ever had during slavery? Maybe, if he could get the whole Louisiana prison system set up as a business. So he did. (Nat sound) 1 “Weeds and Wheat” Sunday, July 19, 2020 Within a few years, James had purchased a former plantation on a sleepy bend of the Mississippi River called ‘Angola’ - named for the country of origin of many of the people who were formerly enslaved there. And James set about doing what a few other like-minded innovators were also doing. Mississippi’s ‘Cotton King’ Edmund Richardson had convinced the state to lease him its convicts. It was a good deal for the state, because they no longer had to feed, clothe, and house inmates. What’s more, Richardson paid for use of these convicts, so what used to be an expense for the state, was now a revenue stream. Richardson would become the most powerful cotton planter in the world, producing 12,000 bales on 50 plantations, every year. Georgia was leasing convicts to build railroads, Alabama leased convicts to work in mines - So it was time Samuel Lawrence James found his niche in Louisiana. (Nat Sound) Paying over $100,000 for the use of all of Louisiana’s convicts for 21 years, and many times that amount for machinery and property, James established a prison that produced 10,000 yards of cotton cloth, 350 barrels of molasses, 1,000 shoes, and 50,000 bricks PER DAY. All using leased convicts nearly all of whom were black, as literally slave labor. His project was so ambitious, he ran out of convicts and had to import Chinese immigrants who would work for the same amount as James spent maintaining Louisiana inmates. However, within a few years, his factory and its looms, boilers, and ovens would be abandoned, as James discovered an even more lucrative enterprise: work camps. (Nat sound) Leasing convicts out to build bridges, repair roads, and lay railroad tracks became a growing - and lucrative - trend. Convicts often cost 1/20th of what a free laborer was paid. Convicts were given the most dangerous and difficult jobs. In Mississippi, convicts built tracks through canal swamps, where they worked with water up to their knees, almost naked, chains digging into their flesh. The heat forced them to drink the water they stood in, relieved themselves in, and now poisoned themselves with. A grand jury found, “many of them with … incurable diseases and all bearing on their persons marks of the most inhuman and brutal treatment… They are lying there dying, 2 “Weeds and Wheat” Sunday, July 19, 2020 some of them on the bare boards, so poor and emaciated that their bones almost come through their skin… We actually saw live vermin crawling over their faces and the little bedding and clothing they have, in tatters and stiff with filth.” Using convict labor was so popular and lucrative because it was cheaper, didn’t strike, and could be driven at a pace free workers wouldn’t tolerate. One report claimed convicts do “30% more work than free laborers, being worked long, hard, and steadily.” (Nat sound) The supply of inmate labor was eased by the passage of some very accommodating laws. The infamous 1876 Mississippi ‘pig law’ defined theft of property worth $10 or more - and carried a sentence of up to 5 years in prison. Other states followed, often attaching a bogus ‘cost of conviction’ charge. This meant that a man named Abe Wilcox, who stole a pig, was sentenced to 2 years in prison, plus 4 more years to pay off his ’cost of conviction.’ James Jackson of Greene County was sentenced 70 days for misdemeanors, but took an additional 4 years to pay off his ‘cost of conviction.’ And Dennis Wood of Monroe County had his 2-year sentence stretched to 11 years because of his ‘cost of conviction.’ Entrepreneurs like James, meanwhile, became millionaires, living in luxury, employing some of his inmates as personal servants, those were the lucky ones - because a staggering 20% of the convicts he leased died while working for him - a rate far higher than even the worst years of pre-war American slavery - deaths he was never held accountable for. When Samuel Lawrence James died in 1894 he left his estate to his son which would be valued today at $63 million. S/U How could something this inhumane, this egregious, happen to so many people for so long? We wonder how God is found here - what purposes are being served - and why suffering takes so long to alleviate. We get some insight from the Gospel. (Nat sound) ’The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field…” Jesus says in Matthew 13. He goes on to describe a crop of wheat that had been sabotaged by an enemy who sowed weeds in the same field. What should be done? Should the bad weeds be allowed to grow up next to the good wheat? 3 “Weeds and Wheat” Sunday, July 19, 2020 Should good and evil co-exist? Shouldn’t the bad weeds be immediately removed and destroyed - so that the good wheat can flourish? Jesus advice was to ‘Let both of them grow together until the harvest…’ At that time, all will be sorted out. While there are a few things we can learn from this, there’s a lot we can’t. We preachers have a nasty track record of trying to find meaning in things that are beyond our understanding. (Nat sound) After the Great Fire of London, preachers argued over what sort of message God was sending. One Puritan preacher said it was obvious that the fire was not a divine punishment on swearing, otherwise it would have started in the markets where the poor gathered. It was not a judgment on lying otherwise it would have started at Westminster where the lawyers assemble. No, it was clearly God’s judgment against gluttony - because it ‘began in Pudding Lane and ended in Pie Corner.’ (S/U) But what we can see from the wheat and the weeds, is that good and evil are allowed to grow right next to one another. God allows them to exist and even thrive. We, then are encouraged to thrive where we are - not to get caught up in the evil around us that is also allowed to flourish, but to be confident that in God’s good time, what needs to happen, will. For you and me, this means taking courage in doing the work before us. Like the African Americans who suffered as slaves and convicts, and continue to do so - we are to do the work of the wheat - growing into who we are: a people of liberation and justice - aware that the work of the weeds continues to thrive all around us - but not to be discouraged because evil will not be there forever. We don’t know why such suffering and pain are allowed such pervasive sway in our world - no one does - But what we do know is that we can’t stand still and let it happen. Friends, this parable is ultimately about awareness and encouragement. Awareness - in that God is working to make you and me more aware of who we are and where we are. 4 “Weeds and Wheat” Sunday, July 19, 2020 The revelations regarding racial justice and the increasing issues of what equity and justice look like are things we are praying will become more of who we are - and what our society will look like. And encouragement for you and me to keep on keeping on. We know how difficult it is - just to get through our days - And the Master is working to bring our world into a more loving, kind, and just place - it does not happen overnight - but it does - and it will happen.

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