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WHY SHOULD WE
OPPOSE TALMADCE?
We have no way of knowing what the average
voter thinks or knows. But if we may take our
selves as an. average—the Pittman candidacy for
governor eclipses anything for calumny, denuncia
tion, carping criticism, destructiveness, "idea-
lessness" that has ever been put before the voters
of this state.
We grant that Judge Pittman is an eminent
jurist, and that his character is beyond reproach,
his intellect -superb, his integrity of the highest
order. We are willing to grant that he is perfec
tion. We are willing to concede that if he were
governor he wouldn't make a mistake, his every
act (if any) would be crowned with unselfishness
and coined into eternal benefaction to the down
trodden populace.
But reckoning him from the standpoint of the
average voter, trying to arrive at what the aver
age voter remembers of what Pittman has pro
posed if he is elected, and what his campaign con
sists of. it is to the effect that he is claiming he
would give the government back, to the people:
that's one thing, whatever it means. The other
(>i;t<tanding feature of Judge Pittman's campaign
is that he has the biggest slime-stick that has
ever been dipped into a stink-pot. and he is smear
ing everythin* and everybody within reach.
That’s a pretty sorry platform on which to
off«r for the governorship. He’s opposed to every- •
thine Taimadge has done, but endeavors to show
how he would improve on one or two of the Tal-
madge accomplishments. But outside of this he
hasn’t advanced an idea. He would be a copy-cat.
Inching up this or that plan ot Talmadge's at
different places, as for instance giving the people
a $2 tag instead of the $3 tag Taimadge gave them.
Pittman knows and he ought to tell the voters that
neither Taimadge nor Pittman can give the voters
any $2 or S3 tags unless a Taimadge Legislature
is elected. Unless the legislators and the people
are is sympathy wi^h the Taimadge S3 tag. the
next Legislature can chunge the law under’ A’hich
Taimadge reduced the cost, and Pittman will be
as Dowerless as a newborn infant to deliver any
52 tags. And yet he would havy the people be
lieve he would and can do' this.
Does that mean that he would restore the old
order of things in the Highway Department? Does
that mean that hi would set that department up
again in control of the State Senate and let it be
operated for political purposes as it was from 1921
to 1933? Does he mean that checks of the High
way Department should be sent to Tennille and
run around in circles before being paid, in order
to cover up the identity of the politician receiving
the money?
Pittman would give the government back to the
people. Does that mean that he would restore the
electric charges in effect prior' to Talmadge’s elec
tion’’ (Now. don’t say the TV A did it and not
Taimadge. The people krow better.)
Pittman would give the government back to the
pconle. Does that mean that he would go back
to the 5-mill state tax. and take from the taxpay
ers over a million dollars that they and their homes
are now being relieved of? Taimadge claims that
increased revenue from gasoline has more than
made up the loss to the schools from reduction of
the 1 mill.
Pittman would give the govemmnet back to the
People. Does that mean that he would take two
million dollars of the highway funds Taimadge
has had saved up with which to get the Legisla
ture to pay the teachers of Georgia and squander
it on the roads which Taimadge has shown could
be built without this two million?
Pittman says ht would restore the l^eminent
to the people. Does that mean he would abandon
the fight for lower freight rates, so that a carload
of freight going out of Georgia should pay no
higher rates than one coming into Georgia. (M y-
be if this is finally put over, Pittman and ms
satellites will say the Insterstate Commerce com
mission did It, and not Taimadge.)
Pittman says he would restore the government
tc the people. Does that mean he would restore
the passenger fares to 3 1-2 cents instead of the
2 cents on railroads in Georgia? Would he restore
the Pullman surcharges? Would he keep railroads
at the disadvantages from which they suffered by
having to charge nearly twice as much for their
service to the people as the buses charged? The
buses got the business at the lower rates, and the
railroads were compelled by law to keep their
charges at nearly double.
Pittman would give the government back to the
people. Coes that mean he would restore the old
telephone rates in Georgia, permitting the tele
phone companies to charge telephone users in
this state 50 cents for something they furnished in
New York for 15 cents.
Pittman objected to the use of the state military
to eject the old Highway Department. How would
he have accomplished the relorm? Would he have
gone through the same courts as other Governors
had done and been defeated, and then sat down
and said there was no help for it—that the dear
people would just have to submit?
Pittman would give the government back to the
people. Does that mean he would send nearly 500
insane people who were confined in jails in the
state back to those jails? Does that mean he would
reinstate the salary and employee list at the state
sanitarium where 70 per cent of every dollar of
the taxpaver’s money was spent for salaries and
only 30 cents went for the patients?
Pittman would give the government back to the
people. Does that mean he would take away from
the school teachers of Georgia the money Tal-
madge has paid them, or simply refuse to pay
them any more money?
He would give the government bock to the
people. Does that mean he would go out and bor
row money and pay enormous amounts of tax
money in interest, as against Talmadge’s having
gotten the state to the point where it can operate
without borrowing, and saving this interest money 7
We hold no brief for Governor Taimadge. He
owes us nothing personally, and we owe him noth
ing personally. Neither has ever asked the other
for so much as the time of day. But publicly we do
owe him appreciation for the clean-up that he has
accomplished in the rotten mess *n which Georgia
had been floundering for so many years. When
the present editor of The Telegraph looked around
in Georgia many years ago tc see what would
have to be done to get Georgia along on a pro
gressive, heartening and reassuring program, there
were three things fixed upon as needing to be
done.
The first of these was to break the strangle
hold of the Agricultural Department and its oi.
and fertilizer inspectors upon the Legislature of
this state. The Telegraph and the people of Geor
gia were defied, sneered at, but the fight went
on. despite discouragements and the fight was
lost every year. Eventually Taimadge came upon
the scene as agricultural commissioner, and he
went before the Legislature and helped to work
out tne plan to take 300 oil and fertilizer inspectors
off their political jobs of fixing counties, reduc
ing the number to six, and even asking that they
be placed in the comptroller-general’s department,
cleaning up the political connection and doing
the most inspiring, statesmanlike, unselfish and
politically unambitious thing that had been done
in Georgia in many moons.
The next thing that needed to be done was
to try to eliminate the scandal that attached to the
Legislature on account of midnight bills and meas
ures that were put through without proper pas
sage and authority. That was agreed to without
a fight when the show-down came, and there is
no need to go into the details. Suffice it to say
that it was done, and since that time no question
has ever arisen as to any legislation being legiti
mate.
The next of the three things was the ugly situ
ation in the Highway Department, which organiza
tion had grown more powerful and menacing than
the Agricultural Department ever was. The
Highway Department had millions in money and
thousands of miles of road project*, and thousands
of employees dlsrtibuted over the state. The
editor of The Telegraph did not wince at the
size of the task. He protested editorially and
personally just as vigorously against the third of
the three evils, as against the first named two.
But to no avail. Then Governor Walker tendered
him unsolicited a commlssionership on the high
way board. This was accepted i:i the hope that It
would speed up the clean-up—that it would be
done peaceably, better from the inside than the
outside, fighting.
But it couldn’t be done. The department was in
the hands of the master politician of all Georgia's
time. The conditions were just as rotten as could
be, but there was no help for it Eventually evi
dence was laid before Governor Walker that
caused him to call for a nearing and he tried to re
move the master manipulator. It went through the
Supreme Court without avail. The State Senate
said it was ridiculous for anybody to bring charges
against so astute and so august a politician as was
running the Highway Department, and threw the
charges out of the window. *
Taimadge came into office as Governor, and
pretty soon he saw who was really Governor and
in control of Georgia. And he found that the indi
vidual didn’t occupy the Governor’s chair, either.
Taimadge proceeded along a different line from
that adopted by his predecessors. He looked up
the general laws governing Georgia instead of the
specially drafted highway laws. And as those al
so provided for the Governor to use the military
in certain emergencies, he used it—and got re
sults.
That completed the three objectives The Tele
graph set out a long time ago to accomplish. Twice
on that course Taimadge and The Telegraph were
joined in intent; their paths were parallel and
led to the same objective. Without Taimadge
The Telegraph would never have seen achieved its
desires for the good of all the people. He rendered
valiant service as agricultural commissioner and
he again rendered valiant service to The Tele
graph's privately adopted program (unconsciously
perhaps) as Governor.
We fell out with li\m about minor matters as
agricultural commissioner, something wnich the
people ok’d for him. and with us it was rubbed
off the slate.
But taking him and his work r.s a whole, his
courage, his bulldoggcdncss, or his stubbomn*'ss.
he has built himself high in our appreciation and
admiration. Whatever he has done about which
we disagreed with him or disagree with him now,
we have to admit that by and large he has made
a wonderful record. A record that surpasses in
unselfishness and for the public good anything
that wc have ever seen by a public official in
Georgia. If he had been a politician he would
have had more sense to have made the enemies
he did, in wholesale fashion. If he had been less
honest he would not have given so much heed to
his platform, in which he pledged the people so
much, and which the people had been taught for
so long in other candidates to regard so .'ightly.
Taimadge advocated reduction of taxes, reduc
tion of the cost of government and elimination of
all unnecessary overhead expenses in all depart
ments. The Telegraph has been urging that al
most ever since there has been a Telegraph, but
has seen the opposite done year after year until
Taimadge became Governor.
Taimadge urged the importance of the common
schools of the state and the payment of the teach
ers, and also the past due indebtedness of the Con
federate veterans. The Telegraph has been doing
this ever since there were any school teachers and
veterans, and Taimadge offers the best prospect of
our seeing these things done.
Taimadge put into effect the )3 tag. The editor
of The Telegraph urged a (1 tag while he was
highway commissioner, holding that the tag was
for identification purposes only, and by raising all
the revenue from gas and using $1 tags, the ex
pense of road building and maintenance would
be placed on foreign cars and state can in pro
portion to their use of the roads, and there would
be no tag juggling. Talmadgo cam* pretty close
to that idea when he put the $3 tag into effect.
The Telegraph urged state control of the High
way Department, to take it out of politics os had
been done with the Agricultural Deparmtent. Tal-
inadgc did that.
Taimadge now advocates th« election by the
people of a lieutenant-governor who shall be presi
dent of the Senate, this to prevent thimble-rigging
of the Senate by selfish interests who arc concern
ed with interferring with Sta*e Government and
promotion of their private welfare. The Tele
graph has been urging a lieutenant-governor for
many years, for the identical reasons enumerated
by Taimadge.
Taimadge urges the election of a governor for
four years, stating that it will not affect him, which,
is true. The Telegraph has many times pointed
out the disadvantages of a two-year term for gov
ernor. stating that if a governor were elected who
really tried to clean up and organize the state on
business lines, he would have to fire so many peo
ple in doing it that these discharged people would
get enough sympathizers to throw the Governor
out ''t office before he could effect any reforms
or changes. The present situation is typical of
what we had in mind.
A large number of those opposing Taimadge for
re-election as Governor are those who opposed him
previously or those upon whose personal interests
he has trod. Many have lost their jobs wi*h the
state, or have bepn intereferred with in their set
ups by which they have controlled and fattened.
Taimadge is charged with building a political
machine. Many years ago. a delegation was In
the office of the editor of The Telegraph suggest
ing that he become a candidate for some office.
As the delegation departed a public official came
in. nnd was told of what the delegation had pre
sented. Snid the public official: "Well, I think you
could be elected, and I should like to see you in
the nlaco. Now, if you do run, and want to get
elected. let me give you a piece of advice—ad
vice which I thinks is the basis of my success in
politic?: "Don’t do nothing to make nobody mad.”
Ye gods and little fishes! Think of anybody be
ing foolish enough to accuse Taimadge of being a
politician or trying to play politics! He started
out with a knock-down and drag-out policy, and
he has been at it ever since—utterly oblivious to
his future or what the public might think of him
f so long as in his own conscience he was doing
something in behalf of public interest. Oh. ot
course he is crouked—crooked in little things which
his enemies would have done differently. But then
everybody is crooked in the opinion of an enemy.
But the aggregate is what men have tc be judged
by. And in the aggregate, in the big thnigs Tai
madge has never lost sight of his promises and his
objectives, and has driven toward them with all
the ingenuity, the force, the fight, the persistence
of a Nemesis.
And Taimadge has been a Ncmises to the politi
cians and sinecurists who have been throttling
Georgia for generations. In the main, he has done
things the editor of The Telegraph wanted done,
and what the editor of The Telegraph would have
done himself if he had known how, other than to
keep plugging away at the evils and attacking
them with all he had, hoping eventually to inform
the people and get some man into office who would
find a way to do what Taimadge has done.
We have always advocated measures gnd men
only as a means to accomplish them. That is just
what we arc doing now. If Pittman is elected
and goes back to the old flesh pots as he indicates
he would like tc do, all that has been accomplish
ed through efforts of twenty years will be nulli
fied.
Why shouldn't we be for Taimadge?
Why shouldn’t Georgia be for Taimadge?
Paid Political Advertisement Contributed by Baldwin County Taimadge Club
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