Tazewell Republican. [volume] (Tazewell, Va.) 1892-1919, 1903-07-02
Tie Ghost Does not Haunt US.
NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS..

Norfolk Nirginian-Pilot.
Upon commenting upon some remarks
of ours, the Tazewell Republican says:
"Our Norfolk contemporary is constant
ly afflicted with belated' spasms on &C.
count of the violation of the rights of the
people by the trusts and it has frequent
paroxysms over the race question:; but
when its attention is called to the bold in
vasion of the rights of tie plain people by
the officeholders trust in Virginia it re-
mains inert as do all its Democratic con.
! temporaries. This office holders trust
began its insidlous work with calling n
constitutional convention 10y the use of
fraudulent methods. 1t pursued its
! treacherOus course by breaking its sacred
people for ratification. And it has 80
shaped the SUITS and registration that
the right to vote will ultimately he denied
to One.half the White voters in the Com.
monwealth. The understanding clause
disfranchised many thousands at the
registration held in 1902. We recall the
fact that the Nlrginian. Pilot, Immediately
after L REGISTRATION, showed that more
white men than negroes had been disfran-
chised in Norfolk
"Our contemporary in 1904 will be able
to see the deadly york of the poll tax
qualification for voting, and will be salts
fed that it was trap set to crush the
elective franchise of the poor man. Per-
haps it will then realize what a serious
mistake it made as an exponent of popu
lar rights in not uniting with us in decry-
ing the wrongs that are being inflicted
upon our people by constitutional and
legislative enactment. 1t will not then
rebuke us for INDUCING in what it calls "a
somewhat belated spasm over the suffrage
article of the new constitution.
In its statement of the position of the
Vhginian.Pilot the Republican is garingly
unfair, though we are sure it had no pur.
pose to be so.
The Vhginian. Pilot opposed the calling
of the Constitutional Convention and
favored revision by a commission to be
chosen by the General Assembly.
Almost or quite alone, among Demo
cratic newspapers of the state, it opposed
tampering with the suffrage, because it
did not believe the changes we're contem.
plated In the interest of the people, or
that the remedy proposed would prove
permanent.
1t made the fight practically single
handed for the pledge to submit the Con-
stitution to vote of the people and it
condemned the Convention for its failure
to keep that pledge.
If there has been treachery, this news.
paper has neither perpetrated nor con-
doned it, and no change OF inconsistency
or subserviency can be LAID at its door
Its withers cannot be wlung for anything
that may befall under the new suffrage
law-and what now seems likely to befall
is the disfranchisement of about half the
white voters.
As for joining its Republican contem-
porary in denouncing whatever wrongs
may have been done by Constitutional
ordinance or legislative enactment, the
Virginian- did what was much better
it foresaw that these wrongs were about
to be perpetrated and, by day in and day
out protest, sought to avert them while
there was yet time. That it failed WAS
not Its fault, and now and hereafter it ex-
plicitly and emphatically does and will
repudiate all responsibility for the deci-
nation of the white electorate of Virginia.
1t took its ground against the disfran-
chisement propaganda and it stands by its
guns, quite confident of ultimate vindica-
ton. In the meantime, however, it is
endeavoring to reduce, as much as posi-
bic, the number of white voters who will
lose their ballots, by urging a concerted |
for registration.