Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page.

V i HEFT VICTU O-F SHOAAJIN6- OrGN E12A.L \jlEVu OF JTNND HOfJ CArMTET-OWpE AnD Crrj-z.eit/i Lfii-O firA/ A/EVA.DA • SP£AK£aS JT>«ao HE AAU-Sf f-fA'JE 5ET THAT CieovuP Cp^a-2.-/ 50M£ SPEAKER fXAT mf DiTORIAL PAGE .The Atlanta Georgian the: home: paper Published Kvrry Afternoon Exrrpt F mdiy By THE GEORGIAN COMPANY At 20 East Alabama Ht Atlanta. Ha. Bnton*rt aj ft#>ron<1 -clan* matter at pontoffice at Atlanta urwtor act of March *.1“* Subscription )*ri< * Delivered by ran er. 10 cent* a week. Hy mall, IS 00 a year How Would a Term in Jail Impress This Judge? What Effect Would It Have Upon Him? Would It Make Him Realize That the Constitution of the United States Poue.v.es Authority Bigger Than His Own? (Copyright, 1012 j At the Movies i’irst let us point out that some of our judges take then, selves a little too seriously. There are among them, fortunately, men of high character and ability. These, let us hope, are a majority. But the public is not bewildered or dazed by a gown of blacn silk which some judges wear on the bench. In fact, these days the public has come to look more closely at the judges and re fuse to take too seriously their estimate of their own importance. And now let us come to the interesting case of a person called A. B. Pittman, who is a judge in Tennessee. The news reports tell us that this interesting Pittman indi vidual put in jail a newspaper editor, Gilbert D. Raine, of the News Scimitar, because, if you please, Mr. Rainc had published in his newspaper an article that the judge had told him NOT to print. The judge in sending this man to jail did not get tbe opinion of a jury or of other judges. He simply had said to the editor of the newspaper, "You must not print such an article.’’ And when the editor printed it he put him in jail. We assume that this judge is personally honest and that the main trouble with him is that he hasn t read the Constitution of the United States and doesn t realize that a two penny judge is a •mailer factor in this nation than the Constitution. If the judge had read the Constitution he would know that it •ays something about liberty of the press. And he would know that those that wrote the Constitution, which unfortunately provides a pretty easy way for dishonest men to get on the bench, never intended that judges should be al lowed to edit newspapers in advance. We assume, as we have said, that this judge happens to be an honest man personally, that he is not a grafter, doesn't take bribes, isn't hired by a corporation, wasn't taken out of a corpo ration law office and put on the bench—in fact, that he is not the type of judge that USUALLY is found objecting to publication of the truth. But, Judge Pittman, suppose that you WERE that kind of a dishonest judge. Suppose you DID belong to the kind of grafting class occa sionally found wrapped up in black silk. And suppose an editor intended to print the truth about you and about your graft. How simple it Would be to forbid the publication of the arti cle and to prevent its publication by threatening to lock up the man who printed it! Would not that be a very easy way to keep your-story and an account of what you had done out of the newspapers and thus TO SAVE YOUR OWN SKIN? Are you not afraid that, immaculately honest as YOU are, in sentencing a man to jail for printing what you don't want in his paper, seme other judge might take the hint and use the power that you have abused to prevent by threats of imprisonment the publication of truth concerning his own misdeeds! Don’t you think, Judge Pittman, that it is a more serious offense for a judge, taking the salary of the people, to violate the Constitution of the United States than it is for the editor of a newrpaper to print something that YOU don't approve. Do you think that man should be put in jail merely because he did what YOU said he must not do? What would you think if it were said to you that YOU must be put in jail FOR DOING WHAT THE CONSTITUTION SAYS YOU MUST NOT DO? What effect do you think a few months in jail would have on YOU and your views of the Constitution? Don’j you suppose it would be an excellent thing if the peo pie of your State and of all the States had the right of RECALL, which would enable them to take from the bench, repudiate AND ST0P THE PAY of judges like yourself who appear to lack ap preciation of the Constitution of the United States? The Little Dramas of Nature. Country Offers Amateur Naturalists of Animal Life as Absorbing and Fasci nating Study as Ever Staged in Any Theater of tlie Universe—Studies of Nature Make Life More Interesting and the Mind Richer. THE ATLANTA GEORGIAN HE execution in the great 8 square at Brussels, of Eg> mont and Home three hun dred and forty-five year* ago, was one of the mjnor tragedir* of hif- tory out of which, sometimes, there come tremendous consequences. Egmont, apart from the fact that he had very “blue’' blood and a whole lot of “rank” and money, amounted to but little as a world force; while Horn was at best but a mediocrity; yet on account of the flagrant Injusth e of the charges that were trumped up against them by old Alva and the cold-blooded fashion in which they were executed, there resulted a state of mind in the Nether lands that was to work mightily for the good of huirianity in all lands and ages. The story of Egmont and Horn '• too long to t« ' here, but those who do not already know it may find it told to perfection in Mot toy’s ‘Rise of the Dutch Repub lic.” It i* enough here to note the fact that in consequence of the Judicial murder of Egmont and Horn there came about the polit ical unification of the Netherlands which enabled William the Silent to lay the foundation* for th^ lit tle republic which ha* written It* name so large and enduring In the annal* of the race. “Like things of another world.” wrote a distinguished contempo rary. “seem the cries, lamenta tions and Just compassion which all the people of Brussels, noble or Ignoble, feel for the barbarous tyranny of this Nero of an Alva;” and out of that feeling was born the opposition to Philip and his henchmen which made possible .the Dutch republic. In his Iniquitous attempt to throttle the liberty of the Hol landers Philip overreached him self. permitted his favorite, the Duke of Alva, to gratify his per sonal spite by the murder of Eg mont and Horn, and in so doing played into the hand of the very cause he hated and was trying to overthrow. Thu* may we s< e how true it is that oftentimes in this world good comes out of evil, and out of thf ashes of Ignorance and Bigotry the flower of Free dom and Pi ogres*. i It is generally difficult to re tain the friendship of the man to whom you have sold mining stocks. • • • The anxiety that some men ex perience in holding a soft Job is more wearing than real njprk would be. * * • '■'ok up to or down upon ve all the horizontal The railroad president has some troubles. eUt he usually get* salary enough to take care of the rent and grocery bill. • • • When we look at some hus bands we cannot blame the wife for preferring the company of a l>et dog. • • * “Pure Feud” laws don’t seem to reduce the Kentucky death rate. It is safer to trust the individ ual with a loud laugh than the one with the pussy-cat smue. • • * «• A man should either be very rich or very poor to enter the game of politics. • • • A faint heart never provoked a breach of promise suit. * • • Health brings happiness to all save the Sioctor. Promotion is liable to tighten the hatband of the most level headed individual. * * • “Wolf of Wall Street” Is report ed missing. Maybe he's hiding in a telephone booth. * • * The cheerful loser is generally the most powerful politician. • • • The young woman hardly ever marries an old man for love. Not a Lifeguard in Sight PASSE vmEjEKW HOH- fHI<- CANTETO^PE ADDPeije’i CiTlZEN-S OF COL.0 TEA. Nevada By GARRETT P. SERVISS I WISH I could persuade every body who is going to take a vacation anywhere in the country this summer to become an amateur naturalist. You needn’t study books nor pursue the subject scientifically nor sys tematically unless you want to, but Just simply keep your eyes and ears open. Leave your gun at home, lent it tempt you to mur der some innocent creature, but take an opera-glass in your pock et if convenient. The stage of nature is full of actors and actresses playing dramas of absorbing interest and offering spectacles as fascinating and beautiful as any that ever the electric lights of the theater s'hone upon. The trouble with most people who seek rest or recreation in the country is that they think only of automobile rides, tennis, golf, fishing and garden parties, and neglect the delightful little sights that are all about them. Birds are really more interesting than golf balls, and the charm of a brook is not summed up in the trout that spring at your bait. Charms of Nature. If a list were made, not of the greatest but of the happiest, men who have lived, It poems to me that Gilbert White, of Selborne, would stand near the head, be cause of the delight that he found in simply watching the little dramas of nature about him—a delight which he succeeded in transmitting, through his wonder ful book, to many generations of his successors on the earth. He wrote only that one little book, and he talked only of birds*, bees, wasps, fish, trees, storms, springs, ponds, glow-worms, squirrels— and one old tortoise—but what he wrote will be read with avidity after a million novels have been forgotten. . Consider only the pleasure the instruction, the philosophy and the delight that he got from that tortois*e, which ho made the most famous turtle in all history and whose shell is preserved, on Gil bert White’s account, in the Brit ish National Museum. The tortoise turns up at un expected junctures in many parts of the book. When you have got a little taste of his quality, you look for him as you look for the appearances' of Hamlet in the play. When the dandelions are starring the meadows, up comes the tortoise out of his mud bed. He is covered wfth a shell that could bear the weight of a cart wheel, and yet he pulls in his head and runs for shelter at the slight est sprinkling of rain! A sultry March day bring him out, like a hibernating fly buzzing round a Christmas hearth, but a touch of returning frost sends him scur rying under ground. A golden day in November plays another * trick upon his instinct, and out \ he comes from the mud, and hob bles to the feet of a good old lady whom he has known for thirty years. Age Will Bring Wisdom. But he is only a youth yet. for 1 the chelontan *»pan of life covers a century or more, and if he were older, perhaps he would be wiser, and not let the vagaries of the season fool him. Gilbert White studies all has movements, gets at all his se crets, admires his sagacity, and wonders at hi * deliberate move ments when he begins to dig his winter bed in a swamp, for. “the motion of its legs is ridiculously slow, little ’•ceeding the hour- hand of a clock!” White made the acquaintance of this tortoise at a friend’s house in Sussex and whenever he went there, looked him up or saw where he was sleeping. Finally be bought him, dug him out of his hlbernaculum.or winter dormi tory, hissing with anger at being disturbed, and carried him in a box of earth. 80 miles by post- chaises, and put him in his own garden. It does one’s heart good to see how delighted the old nat uralist was with his bargain. He thought as much of that tortoise a?* you might of a pet dog—per haps more. V Then began a little life drama before an appreciative spectator. You Can Enjoy Nature. To the reader’s regret, Gilbert’ White gives only brief glimpses • of it in his book. You see the < tortoise sitting comfortably under a cabbage leaf when the sun is too hot in midsummer; you catch a sight of him careened up against a southward-facing wall in early autumn to catch every feeble ray of warmth on his back, and, finally, you nee him stealing out of the garden by back ways, eluding the eyes of the gardener and of his master, to keep a tryst in some neighbor’s field, for Cupid’s darts could penetrate even his hard shell! Everybody might be a Gilbert White in a small way, and it is certain that anybody who tries to be will find the world a pleasant er place to live in and his mind richer for the experience. THE PRICE HE PAID By ELLA WHEELER WILCOX. Copyright, 1913, by Amerlcan-Jouraal-Examiner. I SAID I would have my fling, And do wliat a young man may; t And I didn’t believe a thing That the parsons have to Bay. I didn't believe in a God That gives us blood like fire, Then flings us into hell because We answer the call of desire. And I said: "Religion is rot. And the laws of the world are nil; For the bad man is he who is caught And cannot foot his bill. And there is no place called hell; And heaven is only a truth, When a man has his way with a maid. In the fresh keen hour of youth. "And money can buy us grace, If it rings on the plate of the church: And money can neatly erase Each sign of a sinful smirch.” For I saw men everywhere, Hotfooting the road of vice; And women and preachers smiled on them As long as they paid the price. So I had my joy of life: 1 went the pace of the town; And then 1 took me a wife, And started to settle down. I had gold enough and to spare For al) of the simple joys That belong with a house and a home And a brood of girls and boys I married a girl with health And virtue and spotless fame. I gave in exchange my wealth And 8 proud old family name. And I gave her the love of a heart Grown satdd and sick of sin! My deal with the devil was all cleaned up, And the last bill handed in. She was going to bring me a child. And when in labor she cried, With love and fear I was wild— But now I wish she had died. For the son she bore me was blind And crippled and weak and sore! And his mother was left a wreck. It was sp she settled my score. I said I must have my fling, And they knew the path I would go; Yet no one told me a thing Of what I needed to know. Folks talk too much of a soul From heavenly joys debarred And not enough of the babes unborn. By the sins of their fathers scarred. PERTINENT PARAGRAPHS Egmont and Horn By REV. THOMAS B GREGORY.