The Montgomery advertiser., 1902-08-21
A CAMPAIGN OF B1UsTER.

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Brag is a great thing for those who
have no other argument. Claim every
thing" is the theory of those who know
they are engaged in a hopeless cause.
There are politicians who apparently act
on the principle that the people are all
fools and that they will believe and sup
port the man who boasts loudest and
claims most
The canvass of Ex-Governor Johnston is
a campaign OF brag and buster. He is
the most uncomfortable boaster who ever
went before the people of Alabama. That
has been the principal asset of all his
political campaigns 1t was one of his
strongest weapons while he was in Of
flee. His idea was to exalt his own ad-
ministration by belittling others, and to
herald his own greatness by claiming
credit for everything good and charging
everything bad to others. what 1 have
done" was the text from which he preach
ed all his sermons.
Since Johnston became a candidate for
Governor he and his campaigners have
made claim everything their slogan and
they ring all the changes on it. They
claim that he found an empty treasury
and left much more than he found in it
knowing there is no basis for credit to
him as 1t was the result of increased tax
alton.
They claim that he largely increased
the school fund, although they know 1t
is not true. The Legislature did that in
opposition to his wishes. They claim
credit for faultless management OF the
convict department when facts and hg-
ures prove beyond controversy that Its
management was hideously rotten all the
way through. They claim that he reduced
taxes and increased revenues. that ne
cut down expenses and swelled receipts
when the records show that taxes were
inscreased to the constitutional limit and
expenses correspondingly enlarged. They
claim that he added largely to the stipend
of the old soldiers, when that was the
work of the Legislature.
And so it goes, and so 1t has been 60
ing since the campaign opened. johnston
and his lieutenants demand a clean cam
paign, yet their own course has through
out been a continued line of abuse. mis-
representation and unfounded claims.
Johnston is to have credit for everything
good in the State during the last six
years and his predecessors and successors
are charged with everything wrong or
that can be made to appear wrong Jones
and Oates, Sanford and Jelks are all
State-wreckers while Johnston has shown
himself the real and only Statesmen.
The Johnston side of this campaign
will go down in history as the most reck-
less and inscriptions ever known in Ala
bama under the guise of Democracy. He
and his hackers have stopped at
nothing that they think will ben
eft him by deceiving the people.
His personal organ and mouth
piece, loaded to the guards with abuse,
calumnlation, Misrepresentation and false
claims is going to every postoffice in Ala
bama. The malls are crowded with liter
ature that the Republicans and carpet
baggers in their worst days would have
been ashamed of. Johnston's Birmingham
newspaper is model Of political deprav-
ity and unfairness, and 1t is sent free to
all who will receive it in their homes "A
lie never lives to be DID, said wise old
Sophocles. and that may be correct say
ing, but that doesn't matter with the OPP
position to Governor Jelks, if it will live
a week or two and do its work.
1t is not merely that the truth is avoid
ed in making claims for Johnston and his
administration. but that most atrocious
statements are made about Others Some
OF the falsehoods invented and circulated
about Governor Jelks can only be prop
erly characterized by the one word,
damnable Charges of disgraceful con-
duct are made out of whole cloth with
not jot of truth to begin on.
The talk on the part of the Johnston
leaders of a clean campaign is the most
arrant hypocrisy and some of them know
it. Johnston himself knows that his
campaign is not being conducted fairly
but that knowledge never affects him.
His object is to win, and he and some of
his speakers care nothing about the meth
DDS used. When any man who supports
Johnston has anything to say about a
clean and fair campaign he must blush
inwardly, if not outwardly. There is no
cleanness or fairness to be looked for on
that side of the line.
The pertinacity with which Johnston