Water Valley progress. (Water Valley, Miss.) 1882-1918, 1903-09-12
The Vardaman Bue-Bear.

Major Vardaman's nomination
for;:he governorship of Mississippi
seems to have revived some of the
sectional animoslties which exer.
cised such a baleful influence on
the nation for the last half of the
past century. The press of the
North and East continues to dis
cuss its significance with almost
fanatical ardor, and in spirit
that is engende1ed by a misunder'
standing of facts. Believe them,
and a reign of evil is about to be-
gin which will overturn the credit
made by our great sister State by
the wise and judicious admins
tration of Gov. Longsno. They
see in the Vardaman idea a revo-
luton which will drive the negro
from the State and lineage anar.
chy and set her bloody offspring
free to devastate land inhabited
by a high-bred people. Some 60 so
far as to say that Maj Vardaman
is fathering a scheme that has as
its aim and purpose the re- en-
slavement of the black man.
These are not the erratic con-
clusions of apprentices, but the
sober expressions of trained edit.
oral minds, ond their very seri-
BUSINESS betray their sincerity of
conviction. To those of us who
live in the midst of the negro and
who understand him, and espe-
cially to those who have studied
the recent campaign and election
in Mississippi, these erratic and
untrue deductions are amusing
and just a bit irritating. We reccg'
nizs that the race problem is a
deep one, but we believe that it is
to be solved only by those who
know the negro and who are in
genuine sympathy with him.
We know that the South can
not get along as we'll without the
METRO as it can with him, and be-
ing an integral part of our social
economy, to eradicate him would
cause shock that would shake
the very foundations of our gov
ernment. Every right'thinking
Southern man is the friend Of the
negro, endeared to him by memo
ries of the beautiful old patriar-
chal system and by ties which the
North and East can not under
stand.
The South would rise in revolt
against any movement that tended
to drive the negro out oil this sec.
ton. 1t is only fhe vicious, vile
wretches and brutes that we
would be rid Of
Mai. Vardaman lives in the
thick of negroes. He has always
been surrounded by them, and he
knows that Mississippi could not
replace them as field hands for the
cotton plantations. When he en-.
tered the campaign for governor
he made the issue on which it was
fought. Being shrewd politician.
he saw that he must start seme-
thing. that he must stand in the
lime light, that he must attract at
tention. Andrew Johnson's mot
to: MAKE your friends love you
and your enemies hate you" was
his watchword. He was wise to
see that the negro question was
upperm0st in the minds of the
people whose suffrage he sought,
and he was fully conversant with
the hatred born of Rooseyelt's
rash and radical action in closing
the Indianola pOstoffice. This'gave
him cue and he quickly sprung
on the stage with his theory about
the school tax. By forcing the is
sue he put his opponents at dis.
ad Vantage, and all of their learn
ed arguments against the feasabil-
ity and constitutionality of his
theory availed nothing; as the re.
suits show.
The result of this election was
also a protest against the inter-
ference of the Federal govern
ment in the aft sirs of State. 1t
was one way that Mississippi had
of showing the contempt 1t felt for
closing the Indianola postotfice
and in otherwise attempting to-
foist the negro as an Office,holder