The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-08-09
0vations Accorded the
 Lieutenant Governor.
If EImore County Is Overwhelmingly For Conner. the People Are show ,nx It In Most reeuliar
 Manner.
BY WILL n. STEPHAN.

| didate If Elmore county is overwhelm- ingly for Conner. the people Of the
 county are showing 1t in a most re- culiar way
 pr. Cunningham, in his trip through Fillmore county, has had a series of ova-
 tons He spoke at Equality. Monday morning. and he was billed to speak at Central Monday afternoon At the Equality picnic, held just over the line Tn Coosa county. and only six miles from Central, there were so many Gen. tral folks about that pr. Cunningham s friends endeavored to call or the Gen. tral speaking but failed to do 1t. On
 reaching Central they were agreeably surprised to find the school house pack cd with people when Dr. Cunningham m arrived. Looking at the big crowd which assembled in the school house. one could easily fancy that the peo- pie or the entire community, men wu-
 men and children. had assembled to
 greet Dr. Cunningham and hear his ad-
 dress. They received him warmly and gave him an attentive hearing, inter- | rupted by frequent applause.
 | pr. o. & Justice presided Dr. Jus tice Is leading citizen of Fillmore county. Notwithstanding the demands of a large practice. Dr. Justice finds time to devote to an active interest in political and governmental matters. He
 is recognized as strong man politic- ally in the county and one of the bes. informed men In the county on the po- litical conditions in Elmore
 l In presenting Dr. Cunningham to his lneighbors Dr. Justice spoke of his char
 acter and his long service in public I life. He spoke of the enviable record pr. Cunningham had made in those years of public service. and of the way
 in which he had proved himself wor- thy of every public trust.
 l In speaking pr. Cunningham used an | earnest conversational tone, a style of | speaking which. on this occasion, prov l ed most effective Dr. Cunningham, l made no attempt to deliver a passion ate eloquent address. He had trav- | eled that day twenty-four miles fin a
 surry through the sun of an August day
 He had. moreover, delivered a speech of an hour and three-quarters in the open 1 and he felt the need of some restraint upon his energies. But the crowd WAS well pleased with the speech and it wal I a vote-making argument When 1t was over the Cunningham leaders of | the beat were abreeably surprised to hear several voters. whom they consid- cred to be supporters of Mir. Conner, publicly announce themselves for Dr. Cunningham. They were surprised to 1 find Cunningham strength where it had
 been unsuspected.
 H. c. Compton, candidate for Asso- ciate Railroad Commissioner, happened
 in at Central on the day of the spAhk- ing and he was granted chance at | the assembled voters. He spoke for | three-quarters of an hour.
 Dr. Cunningham, Senator w. l.. Lam
 caster and the staff correspondent of The Advertiser were the guests for the night in the handsome country | home of Dr. o. s. Jutsiee. Here they found an expression of the tradi- tional hospitality of the Southern gen. tleman so famous in all sections of the common country. And by the way, everybody on The Advertiser except lthe people in the circulation depart Eyhent would be astonished at the num- Der of daily Advertisers received and read in the intelligent and rural com | munities like Central.
 Tn the early hours of the next morning the party accompanied by Dr.
 Justice drove through the country to
 Eclectic. Elmore county, agriculturally Is greatly misunderstood and greatly
 underrated by the balance of the State
 Whatever 1t Is politically agricultur- ally Fillmore county is among the best in Alabama. So much has been siad of the remarkable growth and de- Yelopment of the wiregrass section of the State that sections equally pros porous d6 are Ln6 DcSt SGEtfOHS OI more county are allowed to go unno-
 ticed. The county Is as fine farming
 section as we would care to see and
 the leading men of the county do not
 hesitate to say that the people are as
 prosperous as they are in any section
 of the State.
 Dr. Cunningham's friends at this
 juncture are willing to admit that Co.,
 mer has the advantage in this county.
 They are not willing to admit that
 he has the overwhelming majority
 claimed for him by his friends They
 assert that his majority at best will
 be small and they are so gratlfied at
 recent developments in the county that
 they are now at work in the hope of
 actually carrying 1t for Cunningham,
 a thing that would have been thought
 impossible a month ago.
 Elmore county as has before been
 pointed out has always been a little
 odd politically. It was only a title
 while ago that the county was re-
 deemed from populist control Tn Coo
 sa county they tell you thataevery Re-
 publican in the county Is talking Co.,
 mer, notwithstanding that they can't
 ty they tell you that wherever you
 find a popuiist there you find Co.,
 mer man. They tell you that wher- kver you find a Populist who has
 been fighting the party for years. and
 who has given up in disgust Is now following the Conner flag. And that
 sort of talk is heard not only in El-
 more county. It Is heard all over Alabama.
 A county formerly so strongly pop ulistic, would naturally fall in behind the sort of campaign MT. Conner is making Local conditions are affecting the resent State campaign In Fillmore county. That old lynching affair is cutting some figure.
 It will be remembered that four white men were convicted and sent enced to the penitentiary for Iynching a negro because he had a quarrel over some chickens with a white man. The best people of the county were stirred up over the affair and at the special term of court to try the lynchers a conviction was secured without much trouble Governor Jelks refused to pardon these lynchers until they had almost served out their sentences in the penitentiary.
 Now, this old lynching affair is one of the strongest things the friends of Dr. Cunningham have to contend with. Men who dwell on hillside farms, the neighbors of the men who were sent to the penitentiary, are still wrought up over the affair. They are still try ing to hold Dr. Cunningham responsi- ble fop Governor Jelkss refusal to par don the men until they had cxpiated their crimes by terms spent in the pen itentiary.
 Some prejudice exists in the minds of the white farmers of Elmore County against the two state prisons, the one at Speigners and the one at Wetump- ka These Elmore County farmers be-