The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-02-21
A LIBEL AND SOME "REQU1UMs.

a LIBEL AMI 0Om6 hGGU4Um S
The Asheville negro organ yesterday
printed three or four columns of sen;le
nonsense and gross misrepresenta ions, in
terlarded with passages Of scripture, over
the name of one V. S. Lusk. While the
signature, the contents and the medium
through which this commune cation reach
IS q small and not over choice section
of the public give ample grounds for ig-
noring it altogether there are some rea-
Sons why it is worth while to- notice it.
Describing the scene of the closing ses-
sion of the State Senate last spring, Lusk
declares that while the Senate was wait
ing on the copying clerks that Nearer
My God to Thee" and ''There'll be Hot
Time" were both being sung in the Sen
ate Chamber at once. He continues,
spelling and all:
"And the two, the religious and the
SacTiligiouS, became so blended in disccrd-
ant cadence that it was impossible TO de-
terInine whether the Senate of North
~ w
revel, or solemn requium over the buli-
ed liberty in North Carolina. Like the
confusion at the tower of Babel, the Lam
guage was so incomprehensive that enc
wist not what the other sang and Will
one sang Nearer My God to Thee" the
other shouted ''There'll be Hot T. me
in the Old Town Tonight" Hold me
up, please don't let me fall, for love you
best of ALL came from minstrel CT the
negro melody, while from the lyric throat
Of the admirer of the pastoral hymn,
arose the sweet cadense, Still all my
song shall be, Nearer my God to Thee. "
Now with all this there Is but one
trouble-it is pure fabrication. Some
songs were sung while the Senators were
waiting but there was no such minghng
OF the sacred hymn and music-hall
catches as Lllsk describes. The Senate
galleries were filled with ladies at the
time. some of whom joined in the sing
ing: there were, we believe, some NH
listers of the gospel present also. The
Senate was not in session, having re-
oesSed, and the whole affair was but one
Of those harmless relaXations in which
much more august bodies than the State
Senate have frequently indlged. The
Lieutenant Governor of the State, the
presiding officer of the Senate Repub-
lican, and, what is more, respectable
one, led the singing. The incident was
not criticised by the ladies' 1t did not
offend the ministers present. Only the
fine sensibilities of Virgilius Semper Lusk
were wrought upon.-Lusk, who was a
member of the Legislature of 1897
Lusk says the Senate Of 1899 sang
''Therell Be a Hot Time" Undoubtedly
there will be, and this pusillarimous libel
OF V. S. Lusk on as able, as pure and as
morally upright a body, body with as
deep a regard for sacred things, as any
that has met in the legislative halls of
this State in a quarter of a century, viii
not tend to make the time any cooler
harmless in itself, which the soldiers III
the trenches at Santiago, men who with
naked hands had wrenched victory from
the jaws of defeat, had made for the
tine being almost a national air. What
did the legislature of 1897, with Virgilius
Semper as an integral part of it, do? And
what the legislature before it?,
Raleigh and North Carolina still reeb
with the stencil and the scandal of 1t all
A lapse of dignity in legislator may
be bad: 1T shocks Lusk. And yet votes
for two mortal months, were daily bough
under the very nose of Luisk without his
suffering one esthetic winge-bought and
paid for, some of them with cold cash
some with poSt-offces, some with revenue
appointments and untold numbers for d
drink of whiskey and a familiar slap or
the back Members were driven about
like so many sheep and were corraled ana
voted by bosses like negroes under a fu
sion election law. Sess, ons were a jest
members a laughing-stock. OF dignity
of responsible and deliberate action, Their
was nothing; of honesty there was pre-
cious little. There are few measures tina
could not have been passed or defeateV
for a very reasonable consideration.
A man who was a leader of this aggre
CATION of mountebanks. ''floaters," tools
negro-heelers, carpet-baggers and rene
gades, the jetsam of an upheaval thai
threatened revolution and brought dis
grace, says that the Senate of 1899 san.
songs The Senate of 1897 sang no song