The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1907-11-05

hurry II forever beneath the
eddying sands OF the raging Crol1
The EXQUISITE humor II mat passage
Is II the reference TO our coTnmiAsoA-
err to Santo Domingo. sent by Pfesa-
dent Grant 10 provide a way for al
sioners consisted OF cid Ben Nad~,
Morrison Il. Waite. CnfSf
Justice. and President White, OF 1oF-
nell. The ~ntouraE embraced FT@a
Douglas and Boss shepherds protneF.
Arthur. a convention OF cauibsls would
debate a long sime as to the best stew
that could be made OF such a layout
one OF the greatest legal arguments
Knott ever delivered was mis- speech on
the bill to restrict the renoFai OF
courts. In the middle Of II ne resort
ed 70 humor. II was AT the perlod
when Bob Ingersol was delivering his
lecture on the Mistakes OF Moses
Knott undertook to imagine what a
foreign corporation knew about those
"ufstakes" He the House.
but he never put the speech In the
Record.
one Of the most side-splitting
speeches ne ever delivered was at a
barbecue at Pembroke, Christian
county, Ky, in 1871 or 1875, when Mr.
Justice John VI. Harlan was the Re
publican candidate for Governor. II
was by the author of the avenue
speech and the Duluth speech. Judge
Harlan was a candidate both years,
and I am sure he enjoyed the hunor
Of Knott as we'll as any one else. KNOTT
is not a wit after the order OF Tom
Reed. There is no sting TO his hui
NOR. 1t is all genial and never ma
licious.
Knott voluntarily retired from Con-
gress in 1888. and was that year elect
ed Governor of Kentucky. "Quinine
jim" Mckenzie was Secretary OF state
and H. NJ. MCCarty was assistant sec
rotary. Alec Grant had a position or
some sort, and Robert Burns Wilson.
the poet, was a daily visitor. Dur
ing those four years the executive Of
fee building at Frankfort was the most
pleasant place to visit il all this Union.
1 think Knott expected to reach the
Senate by the governors route. The
Senate was his place-lawyer, scholar,
thinker, statesman, g that he Is. IL
one would know what a giant grip he
has on political history and on poll
Teal principle left him read Knots
lecture on Andrew J~ackson-a won
date to succeed Beck in the Senate,
and vas defeated by John G.. Carlisle.
[ wish I had a to try to draw a
parallel between the public utterances
the Gothic, the other as brilliant as
the Renaissance. For some years
Knott had the chair Of civics at
Center College, but he retired to his
old home at Lebanon, and there lives
with his books and his friends. Who
that ever heard Proctor Knott relate
'Lige Pinkston's "Jedgernen" of a GER
tain dis. equitable dog. aver imagined
that this man would steal a piece OF
hunlor from Pat DOMAIN, or ANYBODY
else? IT is the finest anecdOte for roll
licking fun in the language-as told
by Proctor Knott when in the vein.
| do not believe that David Turpie
himself could have picked a thing
from literature to which Proctor Knott
was a stranger. What a magnificent
head it is! Big as q bushel basket,
round as an apple. and longer from
the eyes UP than from the eye down
Proctor Knott. hadst thou not been a
poet, and hadst thou not been cursed
With the fatal faculty of humOT, thou
wouldst have ranked among the great
est speculative statesmen of the Anglo
Saxon race!
Chosen to the Kentucky constitu-
tionaI convention of 1S9O-91. Knott
offered his as the keystone Of the
bill Of rights, and it ought to be print
ed in every school textbook in the
Union:
That all men are endowed by their
Creator with equal rights to life. lib
erty, property, and the pursuit of hap
piness; tha in the social compact they
engage to hold these rights subject to
just and impartial laws under which
each shall be entitled to equal pro-
lection and equal privileges. and shall
be equally liable to the duties and re-
sponsihilities thereby imposed. 1t is,
4Iarafor. or1ajnaI +hot orhifro w
power over none shall be exercised in
this Commonwealth: that no privilege.
immunity, eXoneration, or exemption
shall be granted to any man or set of
men. that all others, under like cir
cumstances, may not fully exercise
and enjoy, and that no public emolu-
ment shall be allowed to any one ex-
cept in consideration of public SER
vice, the performance of which shall
be required by law.
That ought to go with Lincoln'S
Gettysburg Grafton, one for the closet,
the other for the forum.
What will become of the initiative
and the referendum when this probe
is put to it. Which Knott inserted into
compulsory education?
If constitutions are intended for any
thing at all, they are intended for the
protection Of the minority. It is a
commO saying, that o pOpul1, yox
Del; nevertheless the ~populace fire.
Q~uently commit acts that are not only
unwise, but essentially ~despotic. and
OF all the intOlerable despotiSms that
my imagination can conceive, the act
Of the State. reaching into the bosom
Of the family of one OF its citizens,
taking his child from it's natural asy-
1um, placing itself in loco PARENTS,
Notwithstanding he may desire to edu-
cate it there. is the most atrocious.
If were sent to find the truest de-
sciple of Jefferson among all living
Democrats, and should run across J.
Proctor Knott. l would say, Thou art
the man" and my search would be
finished.
Copyright, 1907, by F. w. Warren.)