The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1891-11-03
BOYCCTTED.
Bethel Alliance Changes Its Motto, and
Says Special Privileges to all and
Equal Rights to None.

CODN Vi DllC (CpUIOA ACA SONO 49,
editorial i'm the Roanoke Beacon in its
issue of Oct. 9th. in which the editor
COPIES the resolutions passed by Bethel
Alliance on the 18th of September, and
which appeared in The PROGRESSIVE
FARMER on the goth ult by which resO-
buttons the members of Bethel Alliance
stand pledged not to p~atrOnlze that
paper in the future On account of the
stand which it has taken against the
Alliance and the principles which 1T
advocates. In those resolutions we
also warned all other Alliancemen
against it, las an enemy to the Farm
ers' Alliance and as a dissemination Of
the poisonous and dangerous doctrines
of a corrupt partisan press"
The action of course amounted to q
bOycOt as far as Bethel Alliance Is con
cerned, but in that action l am unable
to e any Just grounds for the editor
of the Beacon to charge us with haV-
inc changed the Alliance motto as rep
resented above. For my part, | can
not understand the full meaning Of this
charge; it is so grOundless, so base and
so false that [ cannot even guess at its
meaning. unless it Is hat / e thinks that
by some unwritten law we as citizens
of Washington county, and a ALI
ancemen. are bound to subscribe for
and read his paper, and all the non
Alliance doctrine and abuse to h order
we love so well, which he copies so
literally from the Wilmington Star
and other members of the A%nnanias
Club"
wish to remind the editor of the
fact that the Alliance is II great fam
ily, and as such it has a right to econ
UIoDI 70 itC yoonOhapS that 1tnpotnpp
watch teaches the principles of the
Order, and to exclude all that is often
sive and calculated to breed contention
and cause dissentiOn among the breth-
rem The Roanoke Beacon has a per
feet right to take issue with the Ali
ance and advocate the doctrines of any
party or sect that it chooses, but the
Alliance is not bound to patrOnize it,
and in refusing to do SO they do not
take, or try to take away any of the
BeucOn'S rights or privileges, but we
do claim that though it is a privilege
of the BedcOn'S to publish anything it
pIeaseS, yet it has no mora right to
publish to the world a charge so false
and absurd as the one which we quote
above.
The editor of the Beacon denies most
emphatically that he has ever written
m editorial derOgatOry to the best in
terest of the farmer or the Alliance,
but that he sympaLhizeS with both and
does all in his power to promote their
welfare. l will say just here tn vt a
Republican editor would make the
same profession, and that he would be
just as honest in what he says as the
editor of the Beacon; therefore we pre-
sumo that the motives of both are good,
but we condemn the which they
use to bring about the needed change
in our financial system.
Now, brethren of the Alliance, If the
Wilmington Star is a nOn-Alliance
journal, the Beacon is the same, for it
Is only a trumpet through which the
Wilmington Star blows its filth and
dirt in the face of the Alliance. But
perhaps the Beacon is not responsible
for the news expressed in the articles
which it copies from other papers and
publishes in its editorial column.
| would state for the information of
the Beacon that no partisan paper is a
friend to the Alliance when it asks
Alliancemen to desert the Ocala de
mands which they have sworn to
defend, and to accept the platform Of
any party to which they have sworn no
allegiance. For every man, when he
enters the Alliance, takes an obligation
to be true to the Alliance, and these de
mands are made by the Alliance, there
fore we are under obligations to sup
port them, knowing that they are Just
and righU.
The Beacon processes to be willing to
publish both sides of a question, declar-
ing hat he (the editOr) is not respOn-
Sible for the news of correspondents.
This we admit, and knowing this to be
the case, the writer sent an article to
the Beacon some time z in which we
took a firm stand as an AIlianceman
and attacked an article which the
Beacon had copied from the Whining
ton Star and used as an editorial. but
our article was consigned to the labO-
rlnths of the waste basket. Shortly
afterwards he published an article
from another correspondent criticizing
The PROGRESSIVE FARMER, to which
the writer did not annex his own name
but used the nom deplume of ''Old
Man." Now in the article | wrote |
affixed my own name, in order that the
editor might not be ~censured by any of
his own readers, but that all the blame,
if any, should fall on me Now it does
seem strange to me why the editor was
responsible for the views expressed in
my article, and that too over my own
signature, to an extent hat he couldn't
bare to publish it, when he could pub
lish an article or the opposite side
signed "Old Man, which some believe
to be the editor himself, and then claim
not to be responsible for the views ex-
pressed. 90 consistency, thou art a
jewel"
Bethel Alliance does hold the Beacon
responsible for publishing one side to
the exclusion of the other; but Bethel
Alliance has er Ough horse sense to
know that the editor of a newspaper is
not rs1n res3Rons!6 sst for + everything fgt that "i cor,
that the Beacon ought to have pub