Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1873-09-23

present condition of Alabama is appalling, says
the Tuscaloosa Times. No thoughtful citizens
can contemplate it without shudder of appre-
heusion and alarm as to her future. The trea-
sury is bankrupt; her public debt, actual or
of prospective, equals il the aggregate one-ffth
of the amount of the whole taxable property of
the State. Enormous taxes crush her people
to the earth. Her current expenditures exceed
her available income from every source. Her
public schools, her State University, and her
hospitals and asylums, are threatened with
suspension for lack of means to carry them on.
Labor is demorazed. All her industries are
parayzed. Onerous taxes and unstable rules
are driving both capital and population from
the State, and deter both from coming into it.
Her people are overwhelmingly in debt. and
her revenue laws are working rapid confsca-
ton of their lands under enforced sales of them
to pay taxes. A debased Supreme Court, by
arbitrary and unconstitutional decisions, has
virtually abolished all distinctions between the
races in the social and domestic relations and
invited unnatural and abhorrent miscegenation
between them. Her State officials are, the
majority Of them, incompetent and faithless.--
Corruption reeks in all departments of her State
government. In word, dark present and
still darker future repress the hopes, and para
lyze the efforts of her people What has brought
about this sad condition of things in Alabama
There is but one truthful response that can be
given to the interrogatory. The rule of the
scalawag and the negro has been the architect
of this disastrous overthrow of the fortunes and
hopes of great commonwealth. A "black mans
party" organized, manipulated and controlled
by native apostates and hireing adventures,
has been done the mischief
The Alexandria Sentinel, of the 3rd instant,
says
The Hughes party are striving to make the
issue OF agrarlanism the test In this election
The Communists who murdered in cold blood
the anointed priests of God and overthrow the
most glorious monuments of France, were not
more ultra In their blind frenzy than these peo-
pie In the war they are now waging on the in
telllgence, the honesty, and the property ofthe
State. They seek to infame the minds of the
poorer classes by continually keeping before
them the fact that their opponents are men of
property and means. They inspire them with
Sentiments degrading TO any people, and most
destructive of all prosperity, by preaching the
violation of faith and population of honesty in
business relations. They seek to instill into
their minds class hatred, which is Away SUBJ
verslve of the good of every class. And all this
by the reiteration Of the veriest platitudes and
sophistries of argument. and the widest alb
surdlties and violations Of plain common sense.
The Chatham Tribune of the Sd instant. in
an editorial entitled Our Next legislature
says:
The fact is apparent that the great interests
of the State are as much or more dependent up-
on securing the election of good men to the
Legislature as upon any other act within the
power AID at the discretion of the people. The
legislative branch of the State Government is
the source whence must proceed those laws
which are to control, regulate and preserve our
social, civil and political existence Unless com
petent, able and experienced men are chosen to
frame those laws, the people must suffer the
sad consequences Of SO great an oversight, and
reap the bitter fruits of their own folly. It is
Just as essential now at any other period since
the late admittance Of the State into the fold
of the Union again, that we should have wise.
honest and experienced Legislature.