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upon the reserved rights claimed by the
Journal, yet this exercise of rare self-control
must not be taken as a precedent.
I o one newspaper should not be given up
what was meant for mankind; and the Jour
nal need not plead surprise if hereafter we
seize upon some of the Harvie Jordan gems
of thought which it claims to be private prop
erty.
There are some things which, as Blackstone
tells the new beginners, are not subject to
private ownership; and if mental treasures of
the Harvie Jordan sort do not come within
the reason and spirit of the rule, then, in the
picturesque language of the impassioned law
yer, pleading his best case, “I’ll eat the book.”
At the risk of being sued for damages by
the Journal, I WILL say that one of the
tasks which Harvie now proposes to address
himself to is the breaking up of rascality in
the Liverpool and New York Cotton markets.
Os course; he will soon do this and pass on
to harder jobs. By the time he puts an end
to Liverpool and New York cotton robberies,
and gets that Fraud Order which he and Liv
ingston were chasing so hotly last year, per- -
haps we may hope that even Harvie Jordan
will condescend to notice this question, which
goes to the vitals of the cotton grower trou
bles—
“ Why xion’t you fight the Special Privilege
which has been used to CUT DOWN THE
COTTON MARKET ONE-HALF?”
•8 * M
The End of an Era.
With the passing of Joe Terrell, as Gov-,
ernor of Georgia, there comes the end of an
era in Georgia politics. Would that we could
say, “in Southam politics.”
The record is one that reflects little credit
upon the state. Here and there, good work
has been done; now and then, public opinion
has compelled reform; but the balance was
always on the wrong side of the ledger. True,
the Legislature broadened the scope of Free
School Education, but the system is far from
perfect. True, the Convicts were no longer
practically given away to the Jim Smiths and
Company, but the paid the state,
even now, looks ridiculous by the side of the
S4B per month which Alabama gets for her
convicts, and the still larger sums which our
Lessees get from Sub-contractors. True, the
time has passed when the public treasury was
usad as a private bank deposit, and when a
good fellow with a pull, like Gunby Jordan of
Columbus, could step into Treasurer Hard
eman’s office, and call out, “I want SIO,OOO to
day, Bob!”—and get it, to buy cotton with—
no questions asked and no interest paid. But
still it is unreasonable that a few pet banks
should continue to use public money without
paying the same rate conceded to private
money.
After due allowance for credit for such acts
as these, the condition of the accounts of the
Steward shows woful mismanagement of the
Estate.
Has the Law been enforced? Everybody
knows it hasn’t. The weak, the poor, the
friendless, have been punished; but how about
the rich, the strong, and the influential? How
about those who exploit Public Utilities?
These have mocked the law. They pay
just about as much taxes as they please to
pay, and they bend to little more of th law
than it suits them to obey. Delayed trains
are not posted; station rooms are not lit up
at night; rates and classifications are not put
where they can be readily referred to by ship
pers; extortionate and varying tariffs are im
posed; equal facilities are not furnished to
all; the Trust can get cars when the Independ
ent cannot; and for months at a time traffic
has been blockaded by sheer disregard of the
duties of the Common Carrier.
When the State or the Railroad Commis-
WATSON’S WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN.
sion gets after the corporations for lower rates
and they put forward that monstrous plea of
Confiscatory to keep rates up, we have seen
the value of the property swell like a balloon
being filled for its aerial voyage. When the
Comptroller-General, however, gets after these
same corporations for taxes, we have seen the
same property shrink like a dropsied patient
being tapped.
Constitutional law which forbids the com
mon ownership of competing lines has been
treated as though it had no existence. Stat
ute law which forbids discriminations has
been set aside with a cynical scorn which can
only be indulged in a state where the corpora
tions rule.
In the State of Georgia, the Corporations
have ruled. The first great step was taken
when Joseph E. Brown secured the State Road
at $25,000 per month over a competing Com
pany which offered twice that amount. The
united strength of. Toombs and Linton Steph
ens was insufficient to block the deal.
Since that day we have had Governors who
were in no wise tools of the corporations, but
there has never been any permanent setback
given to marauding combinations.
Convict Bosses, Insurance Lobbies, Fertil
izer and Oil interests, School Book Trusts,
railroad influence, bank power, the Liquor
Dealers’ Association—these have been the
dominating factors of state-policy.
bhe Constitution of 1877 was supposed to
have abolished the Lobby—but when has that
evil influence been greater than during the
corrupt regime of the Hamp McWhorters, the
Harry Fishers, the Tom Felders, the Pat Cal
houns ?
'fhe Constitution of 1877 was supposed to
have guaranteed Competition among Com
mon Carriers—but see how the Georgia Rail
road is leased to the Atlantic Coast Line, and
the Central owned by the Southern. See the
confidence with which the Georgia Road could
forfeit its.charter by such neglect of its road
bed as in England, under the Common Law,
would have worked a forfeiture of the
franchise of a toll-road. See the confidence
with which the Central Road could openly aid
the Cotton Seed Oil Trust to smash the Au
gusta Brokerage Company, by refusing to
furnish cars to the Independent buyer while
fully supplying the Trust. «
In law and morals, such misuse of franchise
is a forfeiture; but the corporations were in
power, and were fearless.
A political machine, of course, managed the
political end of all this. A few lawyers, pro
fessional office-seekers, and subsidized news
paper men—aided and abetted by a variety
show of ignorant voters who could still be
fooled with party names and campaign lies—
steered for the corporations, kept “safe men”
in office, kept hurtful facts out of the news
papers ; kept serviceable falsehoods in the most
conspicuous columns, and thus “kept the lid
on.
In other words, the political machine held
the state down while the Northern corpora
tions plundered it.
I would not devote so much space to these
conditions in Georgia, if they were not prac
tically the same as those prevailing in most of
the states.
Alabama is as badly afflicted as
So is Virginia. So is North Carolina. Few
states of the Union have been able to free
themselves from this loathsome, destructive
bondage, though all are now struggling to do
so.
Last year, we fought it out in Georgia, and
we whipped the Yankee corporations.
In spite of their money, and their venal
tools, their Hessians and their Sepoys, their
campaign tricks and lies—WE WHIPPED
THEM!
And, with the passing of Joe Terrell, ends
the era of Yankee corporation bossism in
Georgia.
With the term of Hoke Smith begins Home
Rule.
By the splendor of God! WE GEOR
GIANS ARE GOING TO BOSS THIS
STATE.
Our Constitution MUST and SHALL BE
OBEYED.
Our statutes must and shall be respected.
Our Common Carriers must do their duty,
OR WE WILL FORFEIT THEIR
CHARTERS. Our Public Roads must and
shall be controlled here in Georgia.
Corporations shall be made to contribute in
just proportion to the public expenses; they
shall be made to furnish decent accommoda
tions to their passengers at stations, as well
as in the cars; they shall be made to under
stand that charter powers and privileges were
granted them to serve the public, here in
Georgia, AND NOT TO PILE UP ILL
GOTTEN MILLIONS FOR A GANG OF
GREEDY SCOUNDRELS AT THE
NORTH.
I do not say that Joe Terrell is, himself, a
bad man—of that I know nothing—what I do
say is that he was the product of machine pol
itics of an evil type, that his policy favored
Yankee plunderers to the injury of his own
people, that he was chiefly a dignified, rather
nice-looking lid-sitter for a lot of rascally
stock-jobbers and law-breakers who ought to
have been put behind the bars, and that dur
ing his entire administration he never lifted a
finger to vindicate the law, or to protect the
victims of these corporation robbers.
But as Achilles remarked in choice lonic
Greek when he came forth from his tent to
take a hand in the fight against the self-confi
dent Trojans,
“They shall see the difference now.”
With Hoke Smith in office, armed with the
confidence, and inspired bv the hopes of the
people, A NEW ERA BEGINS.
•e n n
Leabe tfie Negro Out of It.
Whenever the attempt is made to cancel
the fact that the negro is a negro, the results
are disappointing.
Race-color, race-differences, race-prejudice,
are eternally actual. The stubborn reality de
fies the legislative’ harmonizer, mocks the gen
erous dreamer, and confounds the benevolent
doctrinaire. No matter what illusions we may
have once indulged, it must be apparent at
this late day that the God-made separation of
blacks and whites is not to be reversed by
the puny efforts of man.
Booker Washington may dine with Andrew
Carnegie and lunch with Roosevelt, but he
never felt “at home” on either occasion, nor
would he ever feel “at home” in any white
man’s house. Neither would any white man
ever feel “at home” in any negro man’s house,
never.
When the Federal Government puts negro
office-holders over the heads of white people,
as it is constantly doing, the arrangement is
always felt to be unnatural, and it always in
flicts mortification upon the whites. Bitter re
sentiment is felt by the white boys and girls
in Washington City who are compelled to
work under negro bosses. •
If I were to tell you how one of President
Cleveland's negro appointees patted the bare
shoulder of a lady clerk from Georgia, and
how this same lady, who was the widow of
the son of a former Governor of Georgia, was
hectored and bullied and ordered about by the
burly black negro whom Cleveland’s appoint
ment had made her boss—the hot blood would
burn your face!
Where negroes, like Lyons and Rucker and
Deveaux, are foisted into places where they
have no business to be, the amount of social
injury inflicted upon the state is beyond cal
culation.
Necessity often compels a white boy or girl,
a white man or. woman, to take service un
(Continued on page 12.)
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