Hopkinsville Kentuckian., 1907-10-05

and persons present, when tnis COM
pany through it's officers, did hold
their hands aloft and call their God to
witness the truth of statement after
statement, that the records show were
absolutely false. (Applause.) |
proved by their own documents. by
their own sign manual attached to
solemn contract after contract, that
this combination did exist; | proved
that they had by dummy" corpora
tions, robbed the Federal Government
itself under the very dome of the cap
itol; | proved by the sworn statements
of their own dupes and emissaries that
they ran a ground wire from Ill Fifth
avenue, New York, even to the Senate
Chamber of the United States. This
resolution stands today unanswered, !,
not charge did l make to which it
dared to hold up its foul head and
plead not guilty, ah, you may remem-
Der perhaps that | closed that argu-
ment, contained in forty pages of the
Congressional Record, with these
words II demand, sir, that the law as
it is written be rigidly, quickly and
mercilessly enforced by fine and i'm
prisonment, and that these naughty
bandits be brought to the bar of JUS
tice." (Applause.) That was on the
twenty-eighth day of May, 1906. There,
thank God, is the answer to that pray
er (holding up a copy of the indict-
ment of the United States of America
against American Tobacco Company
and others); the Attorney-G General of
hn TFnff -, l., \
thirty pages of closely written matter,
under his solemn oath, cites to the
bar of justice this unpenitentiaried
thief, and reaffirms and reiterates to
the last detail many of the charges
made by this ''incindiary" .(Cheers and
applause)
l thought that this indictment would
fall with sufficient weight upon
the guilty head of the American
Tobacco Company and its emissaries
not only to silence it, but to place a
finger upon the putrid tongue OF ira
dltiOn and slander, so Tar as l was
(Applause) l come now
with equal emphasis and with the
most direct, the. most positive and
most minute proof, to charge this
same trust with a fouler crime and a
deeper depth of infamy. / thought it
had already sounded all the depths and
shoals of sin, but l was mistaken.
The farmers uniting their strength
opposed the hand of this robber, and
when. like a batfled beast, insatiate
for his prey, it found that it could no
longer dispoil it determined to de-
fame, and and the American Tobacco
Company today is presenting to you
the hideous spectacle of a wretch, an
gered and furious, determined, in his
impotent wrath, to slander those
whom he can no longer enslave.
l charge that the statements which
the American Tobacco Company is in
spring are defamatory, both to this
Association and to the state, and
are false, absolutely utterly false;
and for that crime l have been held
aloft before the people, who have hon
ored me beyond my deserts, and pill
loried as the very high priest of riot
and disorder. l stand by my guns!
repeat with emphasis what / said be-
fore, that such articles as that print
ed by this Saturday Evening Post and
contained in an editorial in the New
York Sun, of date August 7, 1907, are
absolutely, utterly, cruelty, malicious
ly false, and that when they were
written, the writer knew that they
were false. Continued cheers and
applauseD Now. if that be treason,
If that be incendiarism. If l am the
one red figure with the ak and torch
for making that statement, then by
the Eternal God, l stand by it. PRO
longed applause; cries Of Give to
them, A. o." and laughter)
The article to which / specifically
refer was written by a Mr.. Beach, a
for the Saturday Even
ing Post. Mr.. Beach, as l understand,
is the author of many books; he is an
able, skillful writer; he makes an In
siduous as well as a false argument.
The principal reason for taking this
one slander instead of hundred 9th
ers like unto 1t, is because / consider
IL the most dangerous, and because IL
exhausts all the fallacies and all the
specious arguments of the trust. More
than that my friends, Mr.. Beach ap
pears as the friend OF this organiza-
tioni he praises II for its courage anc