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Reconstruction, when the South was prostrate
and bleeding, and when the black Republicans
were raging with hatred against the seceding
States, nobody ever heard of a proposition to carry
ex-Confederate soldiers and civilians into Yankee
land for trial.
Even those ex-C'onfederate soldiers accused of
Ku Kluxing and of murdering—not only negroes
but white Union soldiers—were tried by the
* courts of the district in which they lived.
Our older citizens well remember the Colum
bus case, where several white men of Georgia
were indicted for Ku Kluxing and murder: there
was no threat to drag them to New Jersey for
trial; they were tried in their own county, de
fended by Alex. H. Stephens, and acquitted.
Does the Government consider the failure of
one jury to convict me sufficient evidence upon
which to base the charge that all jurors in our
State are incapable of jury duty? No Republican
President ever hurled such a charge against the
State of Georgia: no Republican Administration
ever put that stigma upon the South.
Which was it that gave the greater offence to
this Democratic Administration: the legal convic
tion of Leo Frank, or the failure to convict Thos.
E. Watson?
The Government made no great outcry when it
failed to convict in the Naval Stores case, in
Savannah; the Government failed to even follow
up the prosecution against the alleged bank
wrecker of Macon.
Since when, has the notion prevailed with the
Department of Justice, that the failure of one
jury to convict in one case, degrades, disqualifies
and disgraces every possible, jury in the State?
This case was already broad enough and suffi
ciently ominous, because it directly threatens the
freedom of the press, which our forefathers held
so dear that they said in the Constitution itself,
that Congress should never abridge it. Congress
has already considerably abridged it; bills are
pending to practically destroy it, and each one of
these bills is fathered and pushed by a Democratic
Congressman.
If the Government now rules that every news
dealer in Massachusetts who handles a New York
publication is the agent of the publication and a
confederate in the commission of alleged crime,
then no editor is safe from ruinous prosecution.
New England editors and publishers could be
hauled to the Pacific Coast for trial, and vice
, versa; Southern editors coul{L be transported to
Michigan, or vice versa; no matter how unfounded
charges might be which the Government would
fcring against the publisher, he would simply be
wuined by that method of procedure.
• President Roosevelt tried that during the last
Wears ot his administration, endeavoring to bring
editors to Washington for trial because
the papers were circulated in the District of Co
lumbia. The Western courts refused to surrender
the accused editors, holding properly that they
were entitled to a trial in the jurisdiction of their
residence. If President Roosevelt could not drag
Western editors to Washington for trial, how can
President Wilson legally do it?
The case is broader even than the question of
free press, for it directly involves a personal
liberty that is as old as Anglo-Saxon juris
prudence.
Under the construction which Mr. Wallace
places upon the law, there isn’t a drummer, nor
a merchant, nor a fertilizer agent, nor insurance
s. agent who would be secure from Northern prose
cution. On trumped-up charges of fraud in ob
taining credit, of dishonesty in not paying bills,
and similar offences, every Southern man who
represents, travels for, and buys things from a
Northern or Eastern firm or individual, could be
dragged out of the State of Georgia and carried
to New York, or Chicago or Boston, for trial.
Such a condition of thing’s would be absolutely
revolutionary, destructive of that personal security
and personal right which Englishmen enjoyed
long before the days of Magna Charta.
What will the people of this and other States
l think of the Georgia delegation, if it silently
J permits this outrage to be perpetrated upon a
|k What will the people of other States think of
Vie Governor of Georgia, elected in part by my
ggKoluntary and unselfish support, if he files- no
o®» r °test against the wrong about to be inflicted
one of his supporters—and old friend and
Blrmer colleague?
■b I again request you to introduce the resolutions
Undemanding an investigation, in order that it may
ko into the Congressional Record and be read
throughout the country.
V I also request that you embody this letter in
Jr your remarks on the floor, so that the letter may
«, appear in the record. In a case like this, without
1 precedent and without law, the cause of one is the
cause of all.
That conspiracy case Mr. Wallace relies on,
where one of the criminals operated in Washing
ton. while his confederate operated in Wall Street,
Lhns rn bearing at all on my case. It takes more
than one to make a conspiracy, and all the con-
THE JEFFERSONIAN
spirators can be tried where any one of them lives.
One of these criminal Jews lived in Washington,
the other in New York; the Government chose to
try both in Washington, and it had the right to
do so, because they were both principals in the
crime; but the Government did not take either of
them to a State where neither of them lived; it
did not attempt to try them in Massachusetts oi;
Illinois.
In my case there are no agents, no confederates,
no co-conspirators and no conspiracy.
There isn’t a word of obscenity in the Frank
articles, nor one single line that violates any law.
The attempt to carry me away from the legal
venue is not so much for the purpose of a fair
trial, as it is to afford an opportunity for the
assassin.
I do not accuse Mr. Wallace or any official of
the Department with such an intent, but T know
very well the murderous purpose of those back
of this never-ceasing pursuit of me, and I think
it only fair that Mr. Wallace, as well as his supe
riors, be put upon notice of this fact. It is prac
tically certain that, if I should be taken from here
to any one of the Northern venues that you say
he contemplates, I would never return to Georgia
alive. That is a consideration very well worthy
the attention of this Democratic Administration,
for the people of the South, at least, would hold
it responsible for whatever tragedy might happen
from the high-handed proceeding against a South
ern man.
Is the whole State of Georgia to be maligned
and stripped of legal jurisdiction over its citizens,
because of the Frank case?
Was it an unpardonable sin for me to defend
our courts and our people, from a deluge of lies
and libel?
Is it a crime to publish an honest report of the
official record in a case of horrible murder?
Black as that record was, its publication had
been made necessary by the infamous methods
of William J. Burns and the Haas Finance Com
mittee.
Bad as it was for the Governor of Georgia to
virtually retry and acquit his own client, I did
not then know that the said Governor actually
and personally participated in the management
of the case: I CAN PROVE IT NOW.
Am I to be singled out for destruction, and
taken from the jurisdiction of Georgia courts,
because of my defense of those courts?
Ninety per cent, of the people heartily approved
my conduct last summer: are they to be rebuked
and punished, vicariously, in my person?
Has the Government any right to say that the
ten jurors who voted for my acquittal are less
honorable than the two who voted the other way?
Were they twelve rascals or perjurers who ac
quitted the Naval Stores men?
Were they twelve rascals or perjurers who ac
quitted the Menace publishers in Missouri?
Were they twelve rascals or perjurers -who ac
quitted those alleged looters of the New Haven
Railroad?
When before has a whole State been arraigned
as unfit to administer justice, because the Govern
ment failed to secure a conviction in one case.
There are thousands of prurient novels coming
from the press from year to year: every week the
New York papers and magazines publish obscene
pictures and stories; such books as Rabelais, the
Decameron, the Heptameron, Tom Jones, Roxa
lana. Madam Bovary, Sappho, Candide, The Bo
hemians, and scores of other erotic works issue
from Northern publishing houses and go through
the mails.
The Government itself received by mail, and
placed in the Congressional Library the very book
/ out of which I clipped the Latin that caused the
Roman Catholic societies to prosecute me.
And the Government itself, at the expense of
the tax-payers, published the Tschimsian Texts —
a book full of raw obscenity—and the members
of Congress sent that book through the mails, all
over the land.
Speaker Champ Clark sent me a copy through
the mails, under his frank, while I was in Florida.
All these facts being notoriously known, who is
it that cannot realize that some special vengeance
is aimed at me, by those who care nothing for
the purity of the mails, but who are using the
tremendous machinery of the central government
to silence or crush one man?
Very truly yours,
THOS. E. WATSON.
Bead Foreign Missions Exposed, by Thos.
E. Watson. Beautifully printed. Profusely
illustrated. Price 30 cents. The Jeffersonian
Publishing Company, Thomson, Ga.
Bead Foreign Missions Exposed, bv Thos.
E. Watson. Beautifully printed. Profusely
illustrated. Price 30 cents. The Jeffersonian
Publishing Company, Thomson, Ga.
EDITORIAL NOTES
By J. D. WATSON
The United States Supreme Court has
unanimously upheld the Income Tax law,
thus sweeping aside any barrier that would
prevent Congress amending the law so as to
make it an equitable and just one.
We are running behind in our expense of
government, even leaving the War Revenue
tax measure in force —without the added mil
lions that the increase in the army and navy
will cost us —we are running behind on cur
rent expenses just as they are now, and some
thing must be done to either curb expenses,
or to raise the money to pay the debts.
It is a. certainty that Congress will not’curb
expenses —it is a certainty that expenses will
be increased —so the only remedy is to find
some means of raising the revenue without
putting any heavier hardships on those who
now bear the brunt of the expense of govern
ment.
The Surpreme Court's decision opens the
way to get the extra money without making
the common people foot the bill.
Will Congress take advantage of the oppor
tunity ?
Let the exemption remain where it is on
minimum incomes, but increase the tax on
bigger incomes—raise the grade on the per
centage of tax levied in proportion to the
amount of income, and the tax will readily
yield an income to the government of two
hundred millions of dollars, or more, whereas
now it does not bring in one hundred million.
In this wav the one hundred million or
more deficit that we see staring us in the face
for the next fiscal year would be practically
wiped out, and nobody would suffer.
Glance at the market page of your news
paper almost any day, and you will see where
some corporation has paid an enormous divi
dend —it is a common thing to see where this
corporation or that corporation is rolling up
wealth faster than the directors and officials
can count it.
Os course this money is going into some
body's pockets, and these vast fortunes that
are being accumulated on account of the war
should bear their just burden of the expense
of the government that enables the getters of
the fortunes to get them.
So rampant is the spirit of prosperity
among a certain class that you read where a
Steel Trust Magnate’s wife gives away Steel
Trust shares for premiums at a Bridge party
—again you read where an Oil Magnate is
offering two million dollars for the controll
ing interest in the franchise of a baseball club
in just one city.
So why not grade tht income tax so that
these mad spenders may at least pay their
proportionate share, instead of lowering the
exemption figure.
Instead of making the man who has an in
come of two thousand pay an income tax,
exempt incomes up to three, four, or five
thousand, but increase the tax so that the man
with an income of one hundred thousand or
one million will pay in proportion to his
income.
No man, in a lifetime, can legitimately ac
cumulate a property that will pay an income
of a million dollars, and a tax of fifty per
cent, on incomes of that size would hurt no
one.
To some extent, it would only be handing
back into (he public treasury money that had
been stolen from private individuals.
't' •t' 'l* 'i*
B epresent a five Kitchin, of North Carolina,
has served notice on the President that the
people will not stand for his proposed tax on
gasoline, bank checks, automobiles, etc., to
raise the additional revenue that the Pre
paredness program will call for, and that said
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