The law of Kentucky[47] required contracts between white persons and Negroes to be in writing and attested by some white person. The contracts were to be treated as entire, so that, if either party should, without good cause, abandon the contract, the other should be held to have performed his obligation.
Mississippi[48] enacted that all contracts for labor with freedmen, free Negroes, or mulattoes for a longer period than one month should be in writing, attested by two disinterested white persons in the county where the labor was to be performed, and read to the Negro by some officer. If the laborer quit without good cause before the expiration of the term, he forfeited his wages for the year up to the time of quitting. That State made it the duty of every civil officer and the option of every other person to arrest and carry back to his employer every Negro laborer who had left, and the person making the arrest was entitled to receive five dollars as a fee and ten cents per mile from the place of arrest to the place of delivery, the same to be paid by the employer and taken out of the wages of the Negro. The Negro might appeal to a justice of the peace who might summarily try the merits of the case. Then, either the master or the servant might appeal to the county court which had power to remand the deserter to the employer or to dispose of him otherwise as it thought right and just, and its decision was final.
In Virginia[49] all contracts for service between a white person and a Negro for more than two months had to be in writing, signed by both parties, acknowledged before a justice of the peace, notary public, clerk of the county or corporation court, overseer of the poor, or two or more
