Rural Retreat times. [volume] (Rural Retreat, Va.) 1892-1918, 1903-06-12
SAYS THEY'LL
CARRY -FOUR
Colonel Slemp the only Republican in
Virginia Delegation
TELLS ABOUT Things REPUBLICAN
Says That the Negro has Been Elimi-
mated From Politics and White
Men Disfranchised-Hun
are Angry at the Democratic
Party.
TELLS ABOUT THINGS REPUBLICAN
Party.

Washington, June 11.-Representa-
tive Campbell SlemD. who defeated
Judge Rhea in the Ninth district of
Virginia, and who is the only Republic
can in the Virginia delegation to the
Fifty-eighth congress. is in town for
few days looking after some minor
affairs of his before the departments.
When seen he was as happy as a
schoolgirl on her way home from com
mencement with her diploma over the
outlook of the Republican party in Vir-
ginia.
I'VE now have one district in the
state in the Republican column said
he, "and next time we are going to
have four. The trouble heretofore has
been that our people have felt that it
was a hopeless fight and always laid
down their arms before the battle was
begun. They proposed to do that last
fall in my district, but at last agreed
TO make a fight. We made it and we
won. Encouraged by our success in
the Ninth district, the party will make
hard fights in the next canvass and,
mark what I tell you, we will carry
three besides the Ninth. They will be
the other white districts of the state
the Tenth, the Seventh and the Fifth.
''In the last gubernatorial fight John
Hampton Hoge received as many votes
as Montague in the sixty white coun-
ties of the state. All the majority
Montague got was from the black belt.
These are incontrovertible facts as
shown by the election returns. Now
the negro has BEEN eliminated, hum
dreds of white men have also been dis
franchised, for which there are other
hundreds very angry at the party which
did it, and thousands are mad with
the Democrats because of the poll-tax
requirement, besides the opposition it
has engendered on account of the Mann
liquor law. Put all these things to-
gether, and you will see large ele-
ment of discount with the Democratic
party in the state. If we can duplicate
our record of tying the Democrats in
the sixty counties mentioned in con-
nection with the Montague Hoge cam
paign, | honestly believe that we WI,
be able to give to the state her next
governor, and that the four districts /
have just mentioned will be represent
ed by Republicans in the Fifty ninth
congress.
And let me tell you, I firmly be-
ieve that the state will go for Roose-
yelt in the campaign of 1904. I never
aw anything to equal the personal
popularity of the president in my life.
II believe that he can poll as many
votes in the white counties as Hoge
did, and more, too, for that matter,
md further believe that the showing
n the black belt since the disfran-
hisement of the negro will be such as
to give Roosevelt the electoral vote of
the state. He will fall heir to all the
advantage gained by the Republicans
over the unhappy predicament the
Democrats of the state have gotten
themselves into.
Summed UP, it looks to me as if
The day of Republican supremacy in the
Old Dominion is close at hand, and
hat it has been brought ON largely
by the misdeeds and unfair political
methods of the Democrats themselves. .
Colonel Slemp said, too, that he had
been assured that the managers of the
Republican national and congressional
committees were going to look more
closely after Virginia and make it a
piece of fighting ground. The presi-
dent is also, said to have given word
that a vigorous fight must be made in
Virginia elections in the future and
financial assistance given in the con-
greSSiOnal districts