The Greenville times. [volume] (Greenville, Miss.) 1868-1917, 1890-01-11
An ADDRESS TO THE LEGISLATURE AND
PEOPLE OF MISSISSIPPI.

The message has gone out to all the
world that Jefferson Davis is dead,
and people everywhere feel that d
great man has fallen. In history his
name will live. 1t will be prominent
especially in the chronicles ofthe Con-
federste government and of the great
conflict through which that govern
ment lived, and In which it went down
We can see in that sad, eventful his
tory only the disappointment of high
hopes, the failure of heroic effort. the
vain sacrifice of precious life and the
wide spread desolation of wasting
war; For coming generations those
chronicles will be invested with the
romance of knightly achievement. The
fortitude aud valor, the patriotism and
principle which gathered the embat-
tied hosts on both sides, and hurled
them upon each other win be recog-
nized in wondering admiration. The
bitterness will have departed. The
sectionalism viii have faded out.
American glory viii be considered the
common heritage coming down alike
from the defeat and from the victory
and American pride viii kindle and
glow because snly Americans could
have waged such contest. We may
trust to history when the time for its
writing shall come, to tell why there is
this universal conciousness that. in the
death of Mr.. Davis, great man has
fallen. In every part of this Southland
there has been a spontaneous express
sion of grief.
The dead Chieftan has been consign-
ed to his long sleep with oil the solem-
nifty and all the demonstration that
civic testimonials and military parade
from the whole Southern people could
give. He was honored in his life and
honored in his death by those whom
he served so long and for whom he
suffered so much, and whom, even un-
to the end, he loved so well. 1t re-
mains for them to rear monument,
which will tell their posterity that they
hohored his memory. Mr.. Davis was
Identified with Miss, and be has been
the largest figure in her history. While
oil the people of the Confederacy re-
cognized him as their official head
and representative, he was to Missis-
sippians borne of their bone and flesh
OF their flesh. lie stood for the whole
South, and so for Mississippi, too, as
the exponent of State Rights under
the Constitution, but Mississippians
could further claim him as belonging
to their family and as given by them
to the common cause.
Mississippi unites with oil her Con-
federate sisters in devotion to their
leader and President, but she SUPER
adds that he was her son and mourns
his loss as mother bereaved. She
will unite with her sisters, too, in erect.
ing the monumental stone as witness
to prove their devotion. but II will be
her peculiar honor that a Mississippian
has earned, by his life, tho proud dis
tinction of such a memorial, and the
priceless need ofso large a love.
The monument TO such man COM
memorative of character SO exalted.
and career SO grand, must be of pro-
portions not only fitting Its purpose,
but also fitting the hands thai shall
build 1t, and the hearts that shall con-
sccrate 1t to that purpose. Mississippi,
we feel, needs only an opportunity to
contribute its quota of material aid.
To Mississippians, as to all the South,
the name of Jefferson Davis is an ap-
peal that stirs the heart. There Is con-
centrated in that namo the glory of
Buena Vista, the achievements of
craftsmanship in Congress and Cabi-
net, the credit of being tho one Presi-
dent of the Confederacy, tho pathos of
Fortress Monroe, and the calm, grand
dignity of the long years since 1865 |;
but, for Mississippians, there Is also the
pride that comes from the thought
that this soldier, statesman and patriot,
this man gentle and generous, tender
and braye, of unblemished reputation
and superb intellectual endowment,
was himself Mississippian.
We trust and believe that there will
grow, from the voluntary tributes OF
the Southern people, and the most un-
stinted Legislative appropriation, upon
Southern soil, up toward the Southern
sky. monument that shall be worthy
tosproclaim to the latest time, the
nanp Of Jefferson Davis.
W. ID, HOLDER,
X. w. MIIIsAps.
HEBER CRAFT.
Subcommittee Of Citizens Meeting
of Mississippians.