Federal Writers' Project – Life Histories/2021/Fall/Section017/Matt Law

Overview

During the era that Matt Law lived, the culture of racism was much more prominent mainly because Jim Crow laws were still in place and racial conditioning was the norm. Unfortunately, structural racism exacerbates all the problems that this individual faced during their lifetime. These issues include corrupt voting, poor quality education, bad medical care and low wages. Matt Law was interviewed for the Federal Writer's Project by. Louise L. Abbitt and Claude V. Dunnagan on 4th April 1939.

Biography

Early life

Matt Law was one of nine children that were born to Pete and Lucy Hall. She was born in Middleton, near old Alec Hawser place on the Red River. Her parents were both slaves to John Hall before the slaves were freed, after which her father became a tenant farmer. Matt went to school for five months in total which led to her leaving school without being able to read or write. Matt says,"I don't reckon I learned so much in the time I 'tended school." She would walk three miles to an old church building where she and eight other children were taught by a field worker when he had free time (which was quite rare). The teacher, who was referred to as ole Uncle Will, had one eye and utilized corporal punishment to discipline his students. At school, Matt spent most of her time drawing pictures and singing songs because all the students were illiterate, however during her five months of attendance she was able to learn how to spell her name. Despite having the option to stay in school longer, she left school so that she could make money washing. At the age of eighteen, Law was then married to a man named Ed, who worked in a brickyard until one day he quit due to the arrival of a new factory. Matt and Ed then worked at that factory stringing together tobacco sacks, a job that was notorious in that era for not even paying the minimum wage. Matt recalls that she and Ed were paid 10 –15 cents for every hundred sacks they did, which was extremely low, so they quit and Ed became a farmer. Matt was also a member of the Holy Cross Primitive Baptist Church and described the preacher as an uneducated, but good man because he was able to convince the sinners to get on their knees and pray. She went to church because she felt as though religion and weekly meetings helped her work better. Matt also experienced corrupt voting several times during her lifetime because white men would take advantage of the ignorance of black people and tell them who to vote for. It is also mentioned that Matt also mentioned that she and Ed had two daughters, one called Sadie, who worked for a white family, and one called Elsie.

Later Life

One day, Matt’s husband came back from the field feeling very ill and she couldn’t get a doctor to treat him because she didn’t have the money to pay, so she attempted to take care of him herself. However, a week later she was convinced that he had pneumonia so she borrowed two dollars from a neighbor so that she could get a doctor to see him. Unfortunately, the doctor only said that he had a case of bronchial pneumonia and gave them ineffective medication. After the doctor left, Matt was scared to sleep in case he died, so she stayed awake beside him. Sometime during the night, she fell asleep and when she woke up and found him dead. Soon after, Matt went back to work to cover the burying expenses, which she said took a long time to be fully paid. Sadly, this wasn’t the last time that Matt had to spend money on sickness and burying bills as both of her daughters died during her lifetime as well. Seeing as Sadie worked for a white family, they helped cover the burying expenses and sent her some really nice flowers for the funeral too. Yet, for Elsie, Matt had to cover all the expenses and like Ed’s death it also took her a long time to pay it all off. Matt wisely said that the undertakers seem to cost more money than one body can make. These experiences caused Matt to make insurance a priority in the bills that she paid so that one day she could get a decent burial that would leave no one in debt. She ends her interview by saying, " I reckin I'll be washing' an' ironin' clothes till I drop daid."

Social Issues

Segregated Education

From 1877- 1950, Jim Crow laws enforced racial segregation heavily in the United States which led to black children going to separate schools from white kids. A premise of the law was that people would be ‘separate, but equal’, however this was not the case and it ultimately led to children in black schools receiving a lower quality education compared to white children. There were many factors that contributed to the low-quality education that black students received all of which were rooted in racism and discrimination. One of which was the fact that black public schools received less funding than white public schools, which led to the schools not having enough resources to sufficiently teach, which can be seen in the case of Matt’s school. Another reason is that the children were likely to be pulled out of school by their parents or the white owners of the farm to work alongside their parents. Another huge problem in these schools were the conditions that black students were taught in – they ranged from untidy to positively filthy. The books that they had would be hand-me-downs from the white schools and they would have all the grades in the same room, from toddler to 8th grade. The teachers were not fully trained like the white teachers were and they were prevented from teaching about certain literature such as the declaration of independence or the U.S constitution. Since education is the key to everything, the fact that it was withheld from black children was a tool of oppression to keep them in the cycle of poverty that slavery had forced them into. It was a common thought among people that black children did not need education and this idea was widely perpetrated to keep black people as ignorant as possible.

Black Medical Care

‘Racism is, at least in part, responsible for the fact African Americans, since arriving as slaves, have had the worst health care, the worst health status, and the worst health outcome of any racial or ethnic group in the U.S.’ Many doctors and scientists who were famous for their wealth of knowledge helped to perpetuate false ideas about black medical care. Some of these ideas included the theory that black people were not affected by certain diseases and the idea that they did not feel pain due to the fact that they were supposedly biologically different and had thicker skin. The unfortunate fact is that these ideas are still perpetuated today with 25% of medical professionals believing that black people have thicker skin than white people which results in them giving black people insufficient medical care especially in emergency rooms. This meant that often in the 1900’s black domestic workers would spend all that had only to receive poor healthcare or none at all. Those who could not afford it would have no other option but to suffer in silence as there was no infrastructure in place for them to appeal to. All these misconceptions contributed to the low health status and health outcome of African Americans. Many false ideas and stereotypes about racial inferiority inevitably led to medical and scientific abuse of African Americans. This trend is still continuing today as medical schools are still teaching false information that they believe to be true. There are several medical textbooks that need to be either updated or discontinued as they include information about ethnic minorities that cause disparities in healthcare.

Biography

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Byrd, W. Michael, and Linda A. Clayton. "Race, medicine, and health care in the United States: a historical survey." Journal of the National Medical Association 93, no. 3 Suppl (2001): 11S.

Canaan, Gareth. "" Part of the Loaf": Economic Conditions of Chicago's African-American Working Class During the 1920's." Journal of Social History 35, no. 1 (2001): 147-174.

Crouthamel, James L. "The Springfield race riot of 1908." The Journal of Negro History 45, no. 3 (1960): 164-181.

Irons, Peter. “Jim Crow's Schools.” American Federation of Teachers. Last modified August 8, 2014.

Rogers, Naomi. "Race and the politics of polio: Warm Springs, Tuskegee, and the March of Dimes." American Journal of Public Health 97, no. 5 (2007): 784-795.

Rotondi, Jessica P. “Underpaid, but Employed: How the Great Depression Affected Working Women.” History.com. A&E Television Networks, March 11, 2019.

Notes

[1] Abbitt, Louise L., and Claude V. Dunnagan. 2021. "Folder 274: Abbitt, Louise L., And Claude V. Dunnagan (Interviewers): Reckin' I'll Be Washin' An Ironin' Till I Drop Daid :: Federal Writers Project Papers". Accessed November 1. https://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/ref/collection/03709/id/777.

[2] Byrd, W. Michael, and Linda A. Clayton. "Race, medicine, and health care in the United States: a historical survey." Journal of the National Medical Association 93, no. 3 Suppl (2001): 11S.