1889_public laws_170_18
CHAPTER 169 An act in relation to indigent and other apprentices. The General Assembly of North Carolina do enact:
Minor children above the age of fourteen and under twenty-one years being males, and eighteen being females, whether indigent or not, may be apprenticed to learn the art or mystery of any trade or craft by their father, or in case of his death, incompetency, or where he shall have wilfully abandoned his family for six months without making suitable provisions for their support, or has become an habitual drunkard, by their mother or by their legal guardian; and if illegitimate, they may be bound by their mother, and if they % have no parent competent to act and no guardian, they may bind themselves with the approbation of the superior court clerk of the county where they reside; but the power of a mother to bind her children, whether legitimate or illegitimate, shall cease upon her subsequent marriage and shall not be exercised by herself or her husband at any time during such marriage. But no white child shall be bound to a colored person, and no colored child shall be bound to any white person if a competent and suitable colored person can be found in the county.