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Public Opinion Throughout the Union
TO THE POPULISTS OF TENNESSEE.
I want every Populist in Tennessee who
thinks he can possibly attend the Radical
Convention to be held at St. Louis April 2,
to write me at once.
I also want the name and address of every
man in the state who has ever affiliated with
the People’s Party or who will probably act
with the reform forces in the coming cam
paign.
Don’t wait for someone else, but do it your
self and do it now. The country is aroused;
the fight is on.
Our principles are in the ascendancy—“the
fields are white unto the harvest.”
Yours for Populism,
H. J. MULLENS, Sec.,
P. P. State Ex. Com.
PENSIONS FOR LIFESAVERS.
Congress will do well carefully to consider
the suggestion that fair provision be made for
the old age, or period of infirmities, of men
who patrol the coast and at the call of dis
tress risk their lives in order to save other
lives and property. These men are none too
well paid while in their prime; they are treat
ed unfairly during the summer recess; and
it is not surprising that the government stead
ily loses their invaluable training because they
must get work and a larger income in the in
dustries. Os course, there is natural hesitation
about beginning a civil pension system, but if
the government refuses to give adequate pay
during service, the least it can do is to care
for its heroes in their old age. If the life
savers do nto deserve pensions what sort of
men do deserve them? —Boston Herald.
THE NIGHTRIDERS AND THEIR CAUSE.
It is a common occurrence to see in the
daily papers reports of a raid by the Night
riders. They are so called because their raids
take place in the night. Without previous
notice they will ride into a town, commit the
acts of lawlessness they came to conduit, and
ride away again without anyone knowing who
they were and whence they came. Their field
of operation is in Kentucky and Tennessee,
in the district known as the “Black Patch.”
The “Black Patch” is the local name given
to a section embracing thirty counties in Ken
tucky and twenty-one in Tennessee, on account
of the very dark, heavy tobacco which it pro
duces. This black tobacco is too strong for
the American or English stomach, but is in
great demand in all the countries of southern
Europe. Until a few years ago the tobacco
markets in Hopkinsville, Paducah, Mayfield
and other Kentucky towns, and in Clarks
ville and Nashville, Tenn., were crowded with
buyers there to represent Italy, France, Spain,
Austria, Hungary and the merchants of the
free city of Hamburg. Buying was done at
the warehouses in open bidding.
Prices were high, the ruling price being in
the neighborhood of fifteen cents per pound.
Then the tobacco trust invaded the field. By
THE JEFFERSONIAN.
controlling the foreign demand it controlled
the buying in the home market. Soon all
buyers disappeared except those who were act
ing as agents for the trust and they contin
ually lowered the price until for the same
quality of tobacco for which the growers had
received fifteen cents per pound only a few
years ago they were offered but three cents.
This was far less than the actual cost of pro
duction, and the once prosperous tobacco
growers saw ruin staring them in the face.
Then the growers organized, forming what
is called the Dark Tobacco Planters’ Protect
ive Association. The association managed to
borrow enough money to build its own ware
houses, store the crop and wait until a buyer
came who would offer the right price. In time
the European governments had to have tobac
co, and the price was raised again until it
reached about sl2 for the same grade, which
had once been sls and had been hammered
down to $3. '
The Trust resorted to the usual trust meth
ods to crush out opposition. Its agents were
instructed not to buy tobacco from an asso
ciation warehouse at any price, but to pay a
premium upon the association’s price for to
bacco sold them by independent growers and
such members of the association as would
break their pledge to stand by the organiza
tion. Cupidity or necessity caused about one
half of the tobacco to be sold in this manner,
leaving the members of the association with
their tobacco unsold and no buyer for it. Then
the night riding began. Towns were entered
and the warehouses of the trust were burned
and employes of the trust maltreated. The
plantations of the scabs who had sold to the
trust were visited, and the seed beds de
stroyed. This could reasonably be charged
to the members of the association. But the
plantations of associations members also were
visited by nightriders who committed like acts
of destruction. As association members could
not in reason be charged with this it appears
that there are two sets of nightriders, each
destroying the property of the other, and that
the tobacco trust, having obtained a monopo
ly of the tobacco trade and having put down
the price to one-third its former figures, is re
sponsible for it all.
It is a war between the tobacco growers
and the trust. How it will end nobody can
tell. Already several million dollars worth
of property has been destroyed. Troops have
been called out and a portion of the “Black
Patch” section is under martial law. Gover
nor Willson, the newly elected executive of
Kentucky, has been trying to arrange a com
promise between the warring interests, but
so. far without success, and the nightriding
continues. A large section of two states is
suffering all the horrors and destruction of
warfare, production is fearfully hampered,
and instead of prosperity and contentment
there is poverty and discontent.
And the repaciousness of a trust is responsi
ble for it all. —Augusta Herald.
YES, THE NEWSPAPERS CAN MAKE
WHITE SEEM BLACK, AND VICE
VERSA.
Lakeland, Fla., Dec. 20, 1907.
Thos. E. Watson, Thomson, Ga.
Dear Sir: I got your magazine past year
with Atlanta Georgian, I am subscribing for
The Georgian again with request that your
magazine be sent me another year, if the same
arrangement is not at present in vogue, I
want your magazine anyway. It is to my
mind the best literature of the kind I ever
read. Years ago I saw so much of abuse of
yourself in the papers that I considered you
a bad man, but since I’ve been reading your
writings I am glad to know that I was mis
taken and wish to congratulate you on the
great work you are doing and trust that your
fitness for even greater spheres of usefulness
may some day be so recognized that the whole
country may get the benefit of your rugged
honesty and executive ability in some high
official station. Send your magazine right
along; do not want to miss an issue, if ar
rangement with Georgian has been discontin
ued, will send cheek.
Yours very truly,
D. H. SLOAN.
GEN. HENRY LEE’S EULOGY ON
WASHINGTON.
Gen. George Washington died at his estate
in Mount Vernon, Virginia, Saturday, Decem
ber 14,1799, one hundred and eight years ago.
He was buried on Wednesday, the 18th, when
his personal friend and eulogist, Gen. Henry
Lee, of Virginia, declared in impassioned
tones:
“His fame survives, bounded only by the
limits of the earth and by the extent of the hu
man mind! He survives in our hearts, in
the growing knowledge of our children, in
the affections of the good throughout the
world. And when our monuments shall be
done away, w-hen nations now existing shall be
no more, when even our young and farspread
ing empire shall have perished, still will our
Washington’s glory unfaded shine, and die
not until love of virtue ceases on earth or earth
itself sinks into chaos.”
Although a century has passed, Washington '
is still first in the hearts of his countrymen,
and his “young and farspreading empire ’’has
reached a pinnacle of development even his
great wisdom could not have foreseen. —Maga-
zine of American History.
ANNOUNCEMENT.
To the Voters of the Northern Judicial Cir
cuit:
I announce my candidacy for the office of
Solicitor-General of the Northern Judicial
Circuit, subject to the primary to be held for
that purpose. I assure you that I will appre
ciate your support.
L D. M’GREGOR.