The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1869-01-30
TENNESSEE.
A Stirring Time Ahead.
Correspondence of the CourierJournaLl
NASHVILLE, January 26, 1869.

TCorrespsndence of the CourierJournall
NASHVILLE, January 26, 1869.
l will give you briefly, but accurate
ly, a pen-picture of the situation IL
Tennessee at the present moment.
Andrew johnson is expected to ar
rive here by the middle of March. de
has written to his friends to say that he
will be candidate for Governor. No
one will oppose his nomination. twill
be made spontaneously by the Conser,
vatives; and his platform will consist Of
universal amnesty and impartial sur
frage,n on which the people of Tennes-
see haze risked their claims from the
first.
He is expected to do two things.
1st. He will talk to the negroes as no
one else has ever talked to them.
ID. He will waken the East Tennes-
see ''loyalists" TO a sense of the perls
of the present State government as no
one else can waken them.
johnson is not wit, like Etheridge.
Nor is he an orator like Colyar. But ne
is a prodigy of muscular power before
thsTennessee masses, who consider him
a child of destiny, marked by ProVl-
dence to be their next Governor.
Johnson's purpose is to secure Con-
seryative Legislature, which will return
him to the Senate of the United States
in place of Mr.. Fowler. But for their
faith in him the people of the Stately
whom mean the disfranchised masses
would make no contest this summer.
They consider the existing system ma
chine and they regard its operation as
little less than certain. johnson does
not. He says he has fought a worse
fight, and won it. He says he can break
up the loyal leagues as he broke up the
Know Nothing lodges. He will denoance
the Kuklux in unmeasured terms. He
will take strong national ground on all
national questions, and he expects to
carry all before him.
The Radicals themselves apprehend
his coming. Moreover, they are dis
united. Fletcher will probably go into
the State Senate, which will elect him
Speaker. This will give him the Gu
bernatorial succession in II. He is an
able man-the ablest in the State on
many points-and is Republican, but
not a Radical. He is backed by a grow
ing sentiment in his party.
Senter, the present Speaker of the
Senate-is in the line of safe precedents.
If Brownlow should die or resign, Sen
ter would be Governor; but Brownlow
declines to do either, and Senter is Sc.
cretly disconnected. Shrewd Radicals
already look on him with distrust. He
was a quasi-rebel in 6l; and is smart
East Tennessee lawyer with some taste
and spirit. If Brownlow does not give
him-what he considers his right-that
is the Governorship-he will do mis-.
chief. Brownlow's term as Senator be-
gins the 4th of this coming March. His
term as Governor does not expire till
the following October. Will he hold
on to the State Office until it expires
and then go to Washington and draw
his back pay as Senator from the 4th
of March He will. 1t is plain cipher
ing to a man who has nothing to lose.
Bat there are other considerations.
There are personal and prudential mo-
tives-motives which he cannot resist
that impel him. If he should give up
the Governorship to Senter, what would
become of his present deputiesf
For Tennessee, you must know, like
Gaul, is divided into three parts. These
are severally designated East, Middle
and West Tennessee. DR.. Pearne, n
Methodist preacher at Knoxville, is
Governor of East Tennessee. DR.. Boyn-
ton, son-in-law of Brownlow, and
Buck Lewis (cOlored) are the principal
Governors of Middle Tennessee; but
when they are absent or lying about
loose, it is customary for those who have
public business to transact to 90 out
and hunt down Governor or two from
among the negroes and carpet-baggers
Of Nashville. The Governor of West
Tennessee is DR.. Pearne No.2 a brother
of the Knoxville Governor. All these
Governors act in the name of Brown
low, who is at home with the palsy,
having ceased to be of any significance
or to possess any sense of responsibility.
The Radical party is controlled by
strangers and kept going by negroes,
and the coming Moses is Stokes.
The Moses is large, thick-set Moses,
Moses with bald pate and red face,
and voice as loud as that of Bottom,
the Weaver, Moses passing the wit of
man to say what manner of Moses he is
or is not.
Johnson is also n Moses,
And when Moses meets Moses
Then comes the tug of war
l think it is fair to predict that the
chances are even; that the fight will be
sharp and close; and that Johnson may
come out with flying colors.
The KukluX Klan has degenerated
into band of desperadoes. 1t has not
the sympathy of any part of the peo
pie. Its purposes are no longer politi-
cal, if they ever were, but predatory;
and the militia bill and martial law
proclamation are mere preteXts on the
part of the Radicals to carry the cleo
tion by force of arms.