The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1898-09-13
Ghe Wessengm.
GOOD GOVERNMENT AND HONEST
POPULISTS.

sincere and patriotic in helping to
form a new party in the hope of i'm
proving conditions and self-betterment.
In a free country that is certainly a
right and privilege for any eector.
We have known men of pure and hon
orable lives-men indeed of highest
character in the churches, to join the
Peoples party. They were educated,
intelligent, brave for the right, and were
thoroughly sincere in their purposes
and convictions, and they sought such
changes and reforms in public mea-
sures and in the management OF the
government as would prove a blessing
to the country at large-to every sec
ton, and to all classes and conditions.
The Messenger has through the years
thought and believed that the honest,
true ~populists were mistaken as to
some of the measures they favored. 1t
has held that one of their chief prin-
ciples they advocated was wholly i'm
practicable and impossible-the sub
treasury scheme. 1t has insisted that
it's Flank favoring the ownership by
the United States government of all
railroad, steamboat, telephone and
telegraph lines as unwise, dangerous
and impossible because of the tremen-
dous cost, which would be four times
more than the huge wal debt in 1865.
when the great conflict closed.
But for the fair, honest, sincere men
who favored such extreme measures,
so full of class favoritism n CEN
tralization, the Messenger had not con-
tempt nor ~censure, but regret and sor-
row. The person who thinks that this
class came under the c~astigatiOn ad-
ministered is mistaken. 1t was the
the self-seeker, the hot
headed fanatic, the revOlutiOnist in
embryo, the blinded partisan needless
of right, of principle, of the perpetuity
of liberty in this land-the wildcat
theorizer, the political charlatan, the
uCNClNCl LIZ UuCICl III VI poCiAOI
this was the fellow the Messenger sus-
pected, denounced and despised.
And thisis the fellow-whose name is
"Legion"-who has wickedly deceived
his misguided followers, and has grad
ually weakened the Peoples party.
This is the perennial ofice-seeker and
eternal pie-hunter whose patriotism is
nil, but who totes" round his five
lOaves and two fishes" as expressive
G his undying devotion to the greatest
god Ct the greatest number and to the
p .nciples that gave life and vigor to
tie Peoples party in it's early years.
r mis- is the mean, selfish creature be-
meath contempt and to be held in abso-
lutte adherence by every we'll mean
ing, upright citizen.
The good men of the populists have
been bewitched and bamboozled by
artful demagogues and traders, slick
of tongue, reckless of promise, plausi-
BILE, i~nsinuating, sly, bold, with
Cheek" and no little ingenuity.
Behold the result. They have swap
ped with black radicals, traded off hon
est, true men as so much merchandise,
have used them to achieve their ends
and feather their own vile nests.
What have we in North Carolina
now as a result of barter and combine?
"A negro government. The former
slaves are masters now. The whole
machinery is made dependent upon the
conduct Of negroes. They furnish the
motor, the lubricating oil and the basis
of success. This is the output of false
leadership, of abusing the confidence
of honorable and patriotic white men
utterly opposed now and forever to all
niger bOssism.
Can it be possible that the better
class of populists can be farther de-
ceived by the ~treacherous leaders who
mean mischief and undoing? Is it a
fact that a considerable number of
white men IN North Carolina have no
more faith in their race, no more re-
gard for their own interests, no more
affection and sympathy for their fami-
lies and neighbors, no more devotion
to North Carolina, no more consis-
tency and fidelity to principle than to
cooperate or conspire in any way to
help continue negro rule, and to de-
grade the descendants of the great
White race that was born to rule and
has given to the world whatever of
civilization, of grandeur, of glory, OF
laws, of the finer virtues, of govern
ment that it possesses now or has ever
possessed.
We must believe that the deceived
men. the honest and sincere men of the