Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1902-11-03
THOS. WATSON
DEFENDS THE
SOUTH
IN A LECTURE WHICH WAS At
TENDED BY VAST AUDIENCE
HE TOLD OF THE BRAVERY
OF SOUTHERN MEN.

.
! lawyer and lecturer, deliver his lecture
on THE South Thursday night.
THE vast audience sat more erect
as he told in words both
simple and sublime of the daring
| deeps of their forefathers in field and
forum. When, with a magnificent burst
of oratory, he plead for the regeneration
| cestors, when men were brave and up
right and indomitable and women were
pure and fearless and more Godlike, he
was greeted with applause the like Of
| which no former lecturer ever received in
| Atlanta.
Mr.. watson's lecture was the first of
the series of lectures which will be put
on this season under the auspices of the
Atlanta Lecture association and was
| enthusiastically received by an audience
which filled every seat down stairs and
| in the gallery. The lecture was well re-
| ceived and there was frequent applause
and much laughter at the cutting sarcasm
| of Mr. Watson as he told of Israel Put
| MANS ride down hill, of Paul Revere's
midnight ride on an easy gated horse
over we'll paved roads. and of the Boston
tea party. Mr.. Watson dealt not once in
| invective but his sarcasm was as cutting
as a whip His defense of the south was
one brilliant exposition of the brave and
| chivalrous deeds of southern men in the
| field and forum of this country since the
| time the Virginians on the James adopted
| the first constitution and declared for
| home rule
Mr.. Watson was introduced by Presi-
| dent James r. Nutting, Of the Lecture
| association. On the stage sat his son, j.
| d. Watson, who represents McDufhe
county in the legislature, and who SEEM
ed to enjoy his fathers lecture.
In his introduction Mr.. Watson said
hat hOn huH Ixy yauhI eb ad
by northern writer and northern pub
fishing firm, called side Lights on Amer
| lean History" in which appeared the
statement that John Wilkes Booth was
! an agent Of Providence in removing
/ President Lincoln from this mortal
sphere. THE author in his work, which
was highly commended by northern crit
ics," said Mr.. Watson, said that Provi-
| Aence had Lincoln removed because his
policy of reconstruction in the south was
| too lenient and too merciful and that
Providence had made John Wilkes Booth
an agent to destroy Lincoln IN order to
deal with the south as it ought to be
dealt with, in order that it might suffer
| from the more drastic and inhuman
| treatment of Thaddeus Stevens. That
book was received well at the north, and
as yet I have heard no protest from the
| south
"Do you have no interest in your Sec
/ ton? 1t is timely for me to ask such a
question when your schools are flooded
| with books whichic call your fathers reb-
els and the black sheep of this nation.
| II these statements are true, let them
be published without protest, but If they
aresuntrue it is our duty to protest until
the records be corrected.
'It Is not for me to fan into flames the
! mouldering fires of sectionalism. dis
claim for all time such purpose. but 1
do want to set the south right before the
nations Of the world, and in this 1 should
| have the aid of every person at the south
and of every fair-minded person at the
north.
1--WE get an IDEA from he, school books
of the south that the pilgrim fathers es-
| tablished the first form of democratic
government ever established in America.
| Why, I'm washington they have a monu-
ment, chlseled from the living marble,
showing Winthrop holding in his hand the
| Mayfower compact, teaching us that this
was the first form of civil government in
| America. AS a narrow fact, the govern
ment of the pilgrim fathers was a theoc-
| racy, ruled only by the pilgrim fathers,
/ and no other religion was for an instant
tolerated. How could democracy have
expanded in such a narrow prison house
/ as that?
Thirteen years before the pilgrim faith
1
band of virginians had settled on the
/ banks of the James and had established
/ a stable civil government. Many years
before the pilgrims set foot on Plymouth
| Rock, and history and poetry tells us
much of Plymouth Rock, the Virglnians
exercised trial by jury. One year be-
| fore the pilgrims landed the Virginians
| had assembled in the first legislative
| body, at jamestown, and had demanded
| home rule, upon which the whole revolu-
| ton was waged. And all this was one
| year before the pilgrims landed in Amer
| ica.''
Mr. Watson showed conclusively that
home rule, representative government and
trial by jury, the three cardinal principles
| of democratic government, were all es-
tablshed by the virginians before the pill
| grims came.
Continuing, he said:
"But religious federation was needed
and nowhere worse than in New Eng
land, where all who did not conform
to the puritan faith were put to death.
| Maryland granted religious federation in
1649, and in all the southern states has
the privilege of worshiping God accord
| ing to the dictates Of our conscience been
| always practiced, and the banished wor-
| shippers of the north could come to Geor-
| gia and find here a rest for the weary
foot and shelter for the burning brow"
| lie told OF the quaker grave ydTuS all
| over Georgia, monuments to the fact that
| Georgia allowed religious liberation while
| 1t was spurned at the north.
but manhood suffrage was necessary
| to complete democracy, and North Caro-
| lima was the first to grant it. BY her
| fundamental charter, man and land was
| made democratic in Georgia. Georgia and
| North Carolina were the cradles Of Amer
! lean democracy. The pilgrims, with their
| tight bound constitution, did not found
| democracy on our shores, but our fore
1 fathers in Virginia, the Carollnas and
Georgia are the founders Of the Ameri-
can democracy.
'Then there came a time when the
| people must say whether they loved liber-
| ty well enough to die for 1t. Great Brit
| ain encroached on home rule which had
been established by our forefathers on the
James, In 1919 long before the pilgrim
fathers and the Mayfiower had ever been
| heard off.
| THE crisis came. The people must say.
| Massachusetts, said: We must submit
| What did the south say? 1t was Patrick
/ Henry in the Virginia house of burgesses
/ who wrote on the fly leaf Of an old law
book the resolution which is so famous,
and which he backed with words that
every American school boy knows"
He paid a glowing tribute to that IA
nous GIVE me liberty or give me death"
| of he Wfrsfnf1 Ia xxyl,o