The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1886-02-25
JUDGE TERRELL's CONSISTENCY

JNDhE lEhILElIl y 'ON 80 EMU.
The Fort Worth Gazette attributes {
deep political significance to Judge
Terrell's speech on corporations, in his
address before the students of the univer
sity of Missouri last spring, and init
mates that his object then, as now, was tC
make him votes for the United State:
senate. The Fort Worth Gazette nigh
have gone much further back in the his
tory of Judge Terrell's opposition to cor
porations and attributed TO him designs
in the political sagacity that fo1
many years has characterized his pub.
lie utterances in regard to corporations
1t seems to have been leading idea
of all those utterances, public and private
since his youth. He seems to have been
at an early day impressed with the dan
ger to the republic that existed in the
growing power of capital in its concen-
tration in the hands of monopolists, and,
seeing this danger, his voice has always
been against such monopoly that he be-
lieyed would be detrimental to the inter
est of the people.
Fearing the absorption of lands in the
hands of corporations and the formation
of syndicates that would encourage and
cultivate landlordism in this country, the
main and central idea of his life, opposi-
ton to the monopoly of corporations, has
distinguished his political course, as is
clearly evidenced in his legislative career.
To-day we stand appalled, at the
strides made by landlordism i'll the state
of Texas, occupying, as this state does,
the second position only to Illinois in
number of landlords. Judge Terrell at
tempted to have the state house built by
the sale of sections of land to actual set
tiers, governed by his fundamental poll
ticCl idea of opposition to corporations.
All over his political life this idea has been
the governing influence, and will the Fort
Worth Gazette or any other political
opponent of Judge Terrell dare to say his
policy in that respect has been unwise.
On the other hand, what would Texas have
been to-day, under the policy in this
respect of Judge Terrell, in regard to her
public domain Dare his opponents
make fight against him on any idea
that he has ever held and maintained
against the growing power of corpora
tions and their grasping monopoly.
The Gazette may attribute TO him any
motives il chooses, but it cannot convict
him of inconsistency, or venture to call
in question any of his political acts.
The Gazette says his speech before the
university of Missouri has made him
friends of the Farmers Alliance and the
Knights of Labor but that il was made
with a view to his candidacy for the
United States senate. Was his entire de-
votion through a long life to that princi-
pie mere policy to win for him place
in the United States senate:
The Gazette, speaking of his address
before the university of Missouri, says:
These were polite utterances then,
They sound polite now. In the light of
what has come to pass since they were
made, they appear to have been inspired.
The speaker foresaw, as a few Others who
read the signs of the times the spread of
the farmers organization and the growth
of the Knights of Labor, both becoming
formidable forces in politics. Upon the
feeling that is supposed to have gathered
together in support of the principles laid