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will not stop the factories yet. As you move out
others will move in to take your place. Such a
course would add to both the population and the
productions.
You are told to vote for this man and that man
and -prosperity. I tell you voting will not bring
prosperity. Vote rather for principles—then go to
work and to saving for prosperity.'’
German-Americans Rebuke Rev. Dr. Broughton.
A representative committee of the South Atlan
tic League of German Societies, Lodges and Singers
of the National German-Amcrican Alliance has
mailed a letter to Dr. Len G. Broughton, the Atlanta
Baptist minister, who attacked the German organi
zation in a sermon from his pulpit on Sundav, Mav
17.
The letter is a strong document and carries a
stinging, but dignified rebuke of Dr. Broughton’s
unrestrained denunciation of the German citizens
of this section, the truth of which is impeached.
An Open Letter to Dr. Broughton.
Rev. Len G. Broughton, 1). D., Atlanta, Ga.
Dear Sir: During a political address which you de
livered in vour church on Sundav, May seventeenth,
you made a most scurrilous attack upon the German-
American Alliance and its members. Your charges
were so utterly devoid of truth and your statements,
in general, were so extravagant that at first we
hardly deemed them worthy of notice or reply; but
upon more careful consideration we feel that there
are people in Georgia who are ever ready to accept
the statement of a clergyman at its face value, and
unless we answer you many will think that it was
impossible for us to deny the allegations.
You characterized us all as “beer-bellies, brew
ers, bartenders, racetrack touts, apostles of beer and
booze, enemies of Southern chivalry and civilization.
Sabbath desecrators, debauchers of young men and
women, enemies of the government, wreckers of
homes, moral lepers, dive runners, extortioners,
thieves and bums.”
If the American citizens of German descent in
this country were as intemperate in their habits as
you are in your speech, we would all have been sent
to flu 4 penitentiary, hung, or consigned to the chain
gang long ago. If we made use of such language as
you did on last Sunday, before a promiscuous audi
ence, we firmly believe you would be the first to ac
cuse us of profanity and lewdness, and you would
doubtless, enjoying seeing us broken on the wheel,
or subjected to all the tortures of the Inquisition.
And this from a clergyman; this from a minister
of the Gospel of Jesus Christ; this from a man who
pretends to be a follower of the meek and lowly
Jesus; this from a man who preaches love and
charity for all mankind: this from a man who prates
of mercy, peace and justness. “O’ consistency thou
art a jewel.”
\Ye cannot but wonder how much time you have
given to the study of the Book from which you took
your text; we wonder if you have forgotten the in
junction of the Saviour to “judge, not, that ye be
not judged:” we wonder if you have any regard
whatever for the truth; we wonder if you have any
sense of justice or of fairness in your composition:
we wonder if your congregation employs you as a
teacher of theology and morality, or as their politi-
THE REASON
cal mentor and statistician; we wonder how you
dared to say that you had been careful in gathering
your facts and arriving at your conclusions, when
you knew perfectly well that at least, so far as your
remarks anent the personnel of the German-Ameri
ean Alliance were concerned, your facts emanated
solely from the omnium gatherum of your own brain.
May we call your attention to a verse or two of
Scripture?
“If any man among you seem to be religious,
and bridlefh not his tongue, but deceiveth his own
heart, this man's religion is vain." James i.. 26.
“These six things doth the Lord hate; yea, seven
are an abomination unto Him; a proud look, a lying
tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, an
heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that
be swift in running into mischief, a false witness
that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord
among brethren." Proverbs vi., 16-19.
* * # * # #
We pass over your own inconsistency iti charging
the trustees of the Anti-Saloon League with having
“played tin 1 fool" because they favored one of the
gubernatorial candidate's, and almost in the same
breath, as the pastor of a large church, you en
deavored to persuade, not only your own congrega
tion, but the public at large', to transfer their alle
giancel from the man of their choice to the one' which
you had doedde'd was be'st fitted for the* office 1 . We
pass over your scandalous attack upon the edty of •
Savanna h.
* # * # # #
You say the German-AmeTman Alliance is work
ing diligently for the* election of Jose*ph M. Brown.
Permit us to inform you that the German-Amcrican
Alliance, nor the South Atlantic League, nor any of
tlm eighteen charitable', benevolent and military
organizations which e*onstitute' the' League l , ha\e ewes*
take'll any action, e*it lie*r eliivctly or indire'et ly, to
assist e'ither candidate fen* governor, and, further
iimre, we leave 1 newer e 1 \ < *ll conteuiiplateel doing se>.
At our annual convention in Charh'ston we did pass
resolutions in whiedi we urged that Georgia's prohi
bition law be' so modified as to permit the 1 manufac
ture and sale of be*er and native wine's, umlcr such
regulations by the State as would guarantee the.'ir
purity and whole'sonwm'ss; but tlmre was not a single'
word in the 1 preamble e>r the 1 resolutions which
coulel possibly be* construed into an effort to liedp or
hurte*itlie 1 11! 1 Governor Smith or Mr. Brown.
When you charge the members of the German-
Ameriean Alliance with being composed e»f “be'or
bellies, brewvers, bartenders, bums and apostles of
beer and booze,’’ are you aware of the fact that this
is a patriortic American organization, incorporated
by the congress of the 1 l liited State's, with a me'inbor
slbp of one and a half millions of American citize'ns,
all of German birth or extraction? Is it conceivable
that all. or any appreciable number e>f these' de'serve
such approbium as you have Imapeel upon them?
When you charges! the Germans with being dese
e*rators of the 1 Sabboth elid you know that wc owe 1
our two most beautiful religious festivals Ghrist
mas and Easter —to the Germans? * # * *
When you charge' us with enelangering time 1 -
honored American institutions elid you know that
the' Germans first employed women tenders in
schools; that they establishes! the* first normal school
department; that a German devised the kinde'rgnr
ten ?
3