The Athens post. [volume] (Athens, Tenn.) 1848-1917, 1869-10-08
a Speech from Etheri,lge.

The Hon. Emerson Etheridgc was
called out by some of his admirers on
his arrival at Nashville last week, and
made speech. We quote so much of
it as refers to matters likely to engage
the attention of the egislature-as fol-
lows:
Public and private opinion already
maps out to q considerable extent, the
needful work that the Legislature will
be expected to perform, and possibly it
may fall short of that opinion. A con-
vention is to be called that will fix the
right of suffrage beyond cavil and dis
pute: it will lift those restraints by
which the people were overwhelmed
with the burden of an enormous public
debt; it will introduce radical change
in our whole judiciary, and so changed
as to be elected by the people, while it
places on the bench men of ability who
will feel and acknowledge n RESPONSE
bility to public opinion and the bar.
The censorship of the press will be
abolished. call it so because it is the
same in principle as that legislation
which was discontinued in England in
1895, Why should free people be COM
PEELED to patronize few sickly news
papers published in the interest ofa few
political paupers? The whole policy of
the censorship of the press which origi-
mated i'm the Legislatures-the same in
principle as that discrimination which
was made in 1695--to support few
sickly newspapers-parasites upon the
body polite, and run In the interest of
a few political paupers. Hereafter the
press will be left to the laws of just
competition, to flourish through its own
energy and persevering industry, or fall
by it's own neglect or venality.
The penitentiary will be made self
sustaining institution. 1t has cost over
100000 during the last two years. That
time will come no more when there will
be threatened lawsuits against Cover
nors for pardoning out conricts, and the
militia will not be seen upon your
streets. Those tatterdermallions of ty-
ranny in the interest Of oppression will
henceforth be abolished. The many
nameless unnecessary offices created
during the past four or five years, and
among them your Commissioners of
Registration, must be dispensed with.
The so-called franchise law was q cum
ningly devised engine of oppression.
All parties in the State have, at some
time, felt its crushing power. 1t has,
however, exploded before its time. Its
makers and builders were overwhelmed
in its ruin. 1t has not to-day friends to
write its epitaph or preach decent
christian funeral over its remains.
You may rest assured the axe will be
unsparingly applied to the root of every
evil. so as to administer the lie egislative,
Judiciary and other departments of the
State, with marked economy. Beyond
that do not wish to see one dollRi
wrung from the industrious masses o
our State. o.
The past, with all its good or evil, :.
forever gone. The future is not your.
The present, the active. living present "a
yours; its duties and responsibilities
furnish sufficient labor for all. Let us
60 forth with intrepid step in the dis.
charge of every patriotic duty, trusting
to heaven for the coming of that auspi.
cious day which none but the good de.
serve and none but the brave attain.