The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-02-14
SOUTHERN LEADERSHIP.
the New York Tribune.

1
 Edwin A. Alderman, a distinguished southern educator, now president of the 1 University of Virginia, made speech in this city last December in which he in l timated that the south was no longer 1 producing statesmen of the calibre of l Calhoun. Clay Benton and Jackson. i Some offense was taken at this utterance l by southern newspapers and southern public men, and one very able and prom inent southern leader publicly rebuked Dr. Alderman a week or two ago for i giving currency at the north to so dis paraging a judgment. This leader said and with much justice-that perhaps the north, too, was not producing a surplus 1 of Lincons and Websters. Conditions made men and comparisons between the statesmen of one era and those of an- other were often misleading and invid- ious. pr. Alderman has replied to his critics by publishing the text of his New York address, and that text shows that the spirit, at least, of his remarks was misunderstood and perverted.
 l As a southerner he did have some faults to find with southern leadership. But his criticisms were in no sense cap tious or personal The defects he noted were due in the main not to a decline in intelligence and character but to a change in environment-to altered de- mands in public service, to which the po- litical life of the south had not yet com pletely adjusted itself Dr. Alderman be- lieves, in fact, that southern leaders fail. not in being too little like their prede- cessors in equipment and training, but in being too much like them. "The old time" he says, had it's leaders, and they were the best trained men for their tasks ! that this country has seen" The new | leaders suggest the antique type" but suggest it 'fnadequately'' because they live under absolutely changed conditions and breathe a wholly new atmosphere. 1 As the new head of the University of Virginia explains:
 They do not suggest the antique type inadequately because they are weak men or bad men. They are emphatically neither They have brains, character, 1 courage and a genius for politics. They are inhexibly honest. Our leaders, ins deed, have many of the virtues of those who have gone before but they are try | ing to apply the virtues and equipment ! Dl dn age that uenanueu endurance ana steadfastness to an age that demands as well creatiyeness, insight and econom- | ic genius"
 This puts the whole case in a nutshell. The oldtime southern leaders had sim gle definite purpose in politics and pur- sued it with a passionate intensity That was to defend and perpetuate the slavery system. The south whole political and social structure rested on slavery and southern politicians were one in chal- lenging every interest or doctrine which threatened that peculiar institution D The solidarity of sentiment thus achieved gave the old south vast and dspropor- donate power In national politics The new south solidarity on the other hand, represents mere stagnation. Though it's | peculiar interests are no longer menaced, it still holds itself aloof and takes no part in the real labors of national pro- | gross. It's endurance and steadfastness' go to waste because there is no fixed or intelligent purpose behind them Southern leadership is benumbed and l apathetic because the south is only mark ! ing time. So long as it continues to live politically from hand to mouth 1t can develop none of that "creativeness
 which pr. Alderman so justly considers it's greatest present need. If it puts the past behind it and joins sincerely with the rest of the country in solving the problems of the present and the future, it's leadership will soon rise again to the 1 high level of ante-bellum days.