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Our Commentaries on the Week’s Netos
Governor Smith and Immigrants.
Recently Hon. Hoke Smith, govern
or-elect of Georgia, made a visit to Eu
rope for the purpose of looking into
the question of immigration. His main
object was, if possible, to find a desir
able class of laborers who may be se
cured to supply agricultural hands on
the farms of the state, and at the same
time, to arrange with some established
steamship line to bring such immi
grants directly to a Georgia port. Dur
ing his visit abroad, he stopped in Bre
men and received satisfactory assur
ances from the managers of the North
German Lloyd’s line that, with suffi
cient patronage assured, they would
inaugurate a line of steamers between
Bremen and Savannah. The establish
ment of such a line will mean much to
the producers and manufacturers of
Georgia, whose goods go into the ex
port trade, and will go far in their case
to solve the question of international
shipping rates by making it possible
for the Georgia Railroad Commission
to fix the land rates to the steamer
wharf. Mr. Smith found in Austria
and in Southern Russia a class of agri
cultural laborers whose intelli
gence, industry and productive
ness greatly impressed him, and he
thinks that increasing numbers of
them can be induced to come to Geor
gia and occupy the farms of this state
that may be especially opened to them,
or abandoned to them by shiftless ne
gro laborers.
The question of securing European
laborers for our Southern fields is one
that is giving great concern in all parts
of the South, and the general sentiment
is contrary to efforts to bring hither
those aliens from Southern Europe,
especially from the Latin countries,
whose habits and customs, conjoined
with their general ignorance, would
make them unassimilable, and, there
fore, “undesirable citizens” in the
midst of our peculiarly Southern civili
zation. As a rule, they are persons
who are scarcely more than hereditary
religionists, are accustomed to the free
use of the Sabbath for recreation and
dissipation, and are antagonistic to all
those laws which we have adopted for
the safe-guarding of the morals and
sobriety of our communities.
Unless the foreign immigrants who
are sought to be introduced into these
Southern States shall be such as will
be amenable to the customs and laws
of our society, a strong revolt against
all foreign immigration to the Southern
States may be confidently expected.
The need of the Southern States, in
fact, is not so much an abundance
of cheap labor as it is a sufficiency
of steady, sober and industrious labor
ers who will rapidly become intelli
gent and patriotic American citizens.
The Exposition Almost Ready.
As noted in a recent issue, the
Jamestown Tercentennial Exposition
was duly opened with formal ceremo
nies by the President of the United
States on April 26, but as yet the ex
position grounds, buildings and exhib
its are in an unfinished and confused
condition, so that those who visit the
great show at the present time have
difficulty in getting a clear jconception
of its beauty, value and significance.
It is believed, however, by those who
are on the ground, and who are in
terested in the success of the exposi
tion, that all of the exhibits will be in
place, the buildings completed and
adorned, and the entire show in suc
cessful operation before June 10.
That day is scheduled as “Georgia
MARSE HENRY’S STRAIGHT TIPS.
=r_ S'
—Berryman in Washington Gtar.
Day,” when the governor of Georgia,
his staff, and a host of citizens of the
Empire Commonwealth of the South
will be present, and when the occa
sion will be honored by the second and
last appearance of the President of
the United States on the exposition
grounds. The Georgia building at the
exposition is a reproduction of “Bul
loch Hall,” at Roswell, twenty miles
northeast of Atlanta, which man
sion was the home of the President’s
mother, in which she was married to
Theodore Roosevelt, Sr., in 1856. Be
cause he is a half-son of Georgia, the
President has consented to assist in
the celebration of Georgia Day by de
livering an address from the portico of
this replica of the girlhood home of
his mother. The occasion will be one
of unique interest and Georgians from
all parts of the country will be pres
ent to join in the celebration, includ
ing many who are distinguished in
public life, in business and transpor
tation circles, and in military and
naval service. The governor will be
attended, also, by the Fifth Regiment
of the National Guard of Georgia, and
by a splendid galaxy of Georgia wo
men, led by the lady commissioners
of the state.
The Two-Cents Rate.
The anti-railroad agitation through
out the country has not been without
some substantial results. Almost a
third of the states have acted recently
upon the question of passenger rates
within their own boundaries and their
legislatures have found the public un
deniable on the issue of lower travel
tariffs. The legislation has resulted
thus far as follows:
Pennsylvania—Two-cent bill passed
by the house only.
Ohio —Two-cent law enacted last
year.
West Virginia—Two-cent bill pass
ed.
North Carolina —Two-and-a-quarter-
WATSON’S WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN.
cent bill passed.
Alabama —Two-and-a-half-cent bill
passed.
Arkansas —Two-cent bill passed.
Kansas —Two-cent bill passed.
Nebraska —Two-cent bill passed.
North Dakota —Two-and-a-half-cent
bill passed.
South Dakota —Railroad commission
authorized to order two-and-a-half-cent
rate.
Indiana —Two-cent bill passed.
Illinois —Two-cent bill passed the
house.
Missouri —Two-cent bill passed.
lowa —Two-cent bill passed applying
only to roads earning $4,000 a year
gross per mile.
Minnesota —Two-cent bill now pend
ing.
Wisconsin —Rate of two-and-a-half
cents fixed by railroad commission.
The question of a two cents rate in
Georgia is now pending before the
railroad commission and it is perfectly
safe to say that if a refusal of it, or
a splitting of the cent difference, is
offered, the people will reject the ac
tion and compel the legislature to
make the two cents tariff.
The Corey-Gilman Crime.
For weeks the newspapers have
been printing columns of the slush
details of the Corey-Gilman marriage.
Corey was born in Braddock, Pa.,
May 4, 1866, his father being a coal
merchant of modest means. After
attaining a business college training
he began work in the steel mills near
his home at a few hundred dollars
per year. By hard work he raised him
self to better positions, married a good
woman and made a home in which
children were born. He grew as a
business man until in 1905 he became
the successor of Charles M. Schwab
as president of the U. S. Steel Corpor
ation, with a salary of $1,000,000 a
year. He had already amassed mill
ions by his shares in the steel Indus-
try. Suddenly he became enamored
of Mabelle Gilman, an actress, com
pelled his wife to divorce him, and has
now married the shameless woman to
the disgust of every decent man and
woman in the nation. The story is
Babylonish and the crime of Corey,
unfortunately, is beyond the reach of
any vengeance save that of God.
Ccrtelyou and Our Cash.
Secretary Cortelyou would not ordi
narily, and in view of the exposures
concerning campaign contributions, be
taken for a sensitive soul. And yet
he says he is and that he wishes to
avoid criticism in the matter of de
positing government funds in national
banks. He is anxious to impress the
country with the notion that he is not
going “to play any favorites.” The
amount of money depositable under
the law is enormous, but recent re
ports show that a large number of the
interior national banks of the coun
try have reached the danger limit of
loan expansions. The increase of
loans over a year ago is $394,000,000,
while the increase of deposits is over
$100,000,000 less and the increase of
redemption cash is only $40,000,000, or
but 9 per cent of the loan expansion.
This is inflation with a vengeance and
Secretary Cortelyou is naturally wor
ried to find safe depositories for our
money. The best we can ask him to
do is to keep it out of Wall street.
Ben Tillman’s Plan.
Taking it for a surety that William
Jennings Bryan will be the Democratic
presidential nominee next year, Sena
tor Tillman insists that his running
mate should be a southern man. The
senator, probably, does not expect to
see a landslide for the Bryan ticket,
but, like the late Sam Jones, he “de
spises a dull time” and thinks a
southern man’s name as tail to the
Bryan kite would cause the politicians
to look up some. If Mr. Bryan can
not be elected with a good southern
man as his mate he cannot be elected
with any other man on the ticket
with him. We feel that the time is
ripe to challenge the good faith of the
Democrats and the whole people of the
country upon the reality and sanity of
all the reconciliation talk to which
we have been treated for a genera
tion past.
A Conference on Trusts.
The National Civic Federation, a
volunteer body of doctrinaires, one of
which Grover Cleveland is whom —
and that is quite enough to destroy
its popularity—is to meet in Chicago
next September, with invited speakers
from all over the union, to consider
the question of “The Trusts.”
From such a body the people gener
ally can only expect conclusions that
will be ultra-conservative. They will
be told that “there are good trusts and
bad trusts” —and that’s a whopper,
No trust of a commercial or industrial
character can be good! To be a trust
it must enjoy Special Privilege and
every special privilege is a license to
ignore justice and rob the many.
John Sherman was right when he
said “the way to resume specie pay
ments is to resume,” and it is equally
true that the way to cure trusts is to
cure them as we do meat —kill it first
and then smoke it.
Tillman thinks Bryan will be the
logical candidate in 1908, and yet
there are people who think Bryan is
too often and too Illogical in that role.
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