The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-06-20
THE MONTGOMERY ADVERTISER

Section 22 was read as follows: Sec. 22. There shall be . great Seal of State, which shall be used ofiicially by the Governor, and the Seal now in use shall continue to be used until an. other has been adopted by the General The Great Seal of the State of Ala bama.
 MT. Jones (Montsomery)-There Is . substitute reported by the Committee to that Section.
 The Substitute was read as follows: Commemorative of the heroism of Emma Sansom the Great Seal of the State which shall be used officially by the Governor shall consist of the figure of an officer on horseback. fully armed, and a young woman seated behind him with her left hand pointing forward, and the legend T will show you the way" Said Seal shall be called the Great Seal of the State of Alabama. The Committee recommend that Section 22 of the Ordinance creating and de- fining the Executive Department as re- ported by them be stricken out and the substitute be adopted in lieu teherof. MT. Jones (Montgomery)--This sub. stitute was the proposition offered by the gentleman from Montgomery (Mr. Sanford) and desire on behalf of the Committee to yield to the senior mem Der from Montgomery on this Ques- ton.
 MT. sanford--Mr. President I thank the able. polite and chivalrous delegate from Montgomery for waiving his rights in my behalf. But. the gratitude might feel is greatly diminished by a sense of the responsibility that his politeness has imposed. upon me. And the sense of the responsibility is some what intensified by the eager interest which feel in this subject.
 Before as intelligent an audience as this Convention I hope may be par doned if remind them of a few facts and for that purpose I ask their in- dulgence and patience.
 The Seal of great State everywhere in Christendom Is considered the only means by which the sovereign power can make known its will and 1t is per- fectly immaterial whether the Govern ment be a republic. a despotism or . limited monarchy. it Is the only means in which the sovereignty can express its desires or its purpose.
 We know that in England, whence we Pderive a great many of our tnstitu- tions of liberty, that the Great Seal of Great Britain was changed upon every accession of new sovereign. or upon every change of It's arms, that the old seal was broken and the frag- ments were given to the Chancellor as his perquisites.
 Now, has Alabama any seal de jure7 Has 1t ever had since 1s657 What is the great seal of Alabama? May take the privilege of reading the de- scription of 1t by one of the most lettered and scholarly and patriotic gentlemen in this broad commonwealth. I refer to the distinguished Professor Wyman, of the State University, who describes it in this language:
 "A bald-headed eagle-reco1nIzed as 8 bird of prey, ever since the days of the patient Job--a bald-headed eagle, with cluster of sharps arrows clutched in one claw, trampling on the escutcheon of State. The eagles wings are up- lifted, as If he were just honing to sweep down on the State Treasuryl His neck Is craned out to It's full length, as if he were getting ready to bury his beak in the vitals of the body polite! This bald-headed eagle fitly represents the swarm of foul birds who came from the four ends of the United states and from Austria and Africa to loot and to devour the little substance that the impoverished people had remaining to them as the result of the downfall of the Southern Con- federacy But what Is most striking and characteristic of all, the so-cailed bird of freedom bears in his beak 8 scroll on which is inscribed the carpet oagger's favorite motto: Here we resti'
 All this Is profoundly AynbolicaI, 1t Is true. but 1t Is something more-it Is pretty nearly diabolical Whether the fellow from Maine or Michigan-his name, fortunately, has not come down who devised this coat of arms was un- conscious of travesty on the art of heraldrY which he was inventing, or whether he was cunningly devising piece of cruel waggery for the torture of an unoffending people, do not know and 1t makes no difference. The present Seal of State ought to be broken and thrown out on the ash pile, and the next General Assembly ought to appoint a commission to devise new coat of arms for Alabama.
 How wonderfully correct ks 1t in say ing 1t represents nothing that is char acteristic of Alabama! And his de- scription of the influences that caused it to supersede the old Seal of the State is entirely accurate.
 We know that from the End of March, 1S67 that the people of this State for many years were under a military gov- ernment of almost absolute despotism. We know that the Convention that as- sembled here in 1887 on the 1st of Sep tember was composed largely of per- sons who had no permanent domicile within this State. It was composed of negroes. It was composed of foreign erc, some ot whom owed their citiZen- ship to having served in the army and to having plundered our people with resolute rapaclty. They made it. Now it was an old rule of a wise people that whenever a bad man or disrep- utable character. introduced a wise measure in an assembly 1t was voted down. Why? Because they did not wish to give any con- sideration 70 such characters and thea afterwards some good and patriotic citizen would at once rein- troduce the measure and it would be passed. So if that Is a good seal which was placed upoh us on the 18th or No vember .lSGS. 1t would be well to dis card it, because 1t is not the choice of Sae people of Alabama. Let us see with regard to that. Some of you gen. tlemen took part in the proceedings of reconstruction. You were old Confed- crate soldiers. You were statesmen taking rart before the people in the great questions that agitated our coun- try. You knew precisely the character of the men who imposed this travesty of a seal upon our people. It never was adopted. The very Constitution which that rabble pretended to ordain ara, fte1 down bY tho DeopIe of Ala