Page:W. E. B. Du Bois - The Gift of Black Folk.pdf/239

Rh creased expenses necessary. During the period of the war, and for several years thereafter, public buildings and state institutions were permitted to fall into decay. The state house and grounds, the executive mansion, the penitentiary, the insane asylum, and the buildings for the blind, deaf and dumb, were in a dilapidated condition and had to be extended and repaired. A new building for the blind was purchased and fitted up. The reconstructionists established a public school system and spent money to maintain and support it, perhaps too freely, in view of the impoverishment of the people. When they took hold, warrants were worth but sixty or seventy cents on the dollar, a fact which made the price of building materials used in the work of construction correspondingly higher.”

In addition to all this there was fraud and stealing. There were white men who cheated and secured large sums. Most of $800,000 appropriated for land in South Carolina was wasted in graft. Bills for wine and furniture in South Carolina were enormous; the printing bill of Mississippi was ridiculously extravagant. Colored men shared in this loot but they at least had some excuse. We may not forget that among slaves