Staunton spectator and vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1896-1916, 1908-10-02
Assistant Republicans.

The Virginian-P Pilot considers it al
most a work of supererogations to de-
fend the Democratic party against the
attacks made on it by Hearst, Higsen,
Graves and Company. The motive of
their paricidal shafts is as transparent
rs their bluntness. The South has
found safety first and then regeneration
by clinging to Democracy through all
these years. Never to be forgotten is
the fact that had the plans of the Re-
publican party not been foiled by the
stubborn unity of the Southern whites
against all the assaults of radical and
sectional faction, the South would have
remained indefinitely prey to the
ignorant and vicious elements which
gagged the voice of her real people and
d evoured their substance during the
period of reconstruction. The purged
electorates of the South have been
achieved by Democratic effort alone,
and even now the Republican nominee
and platform Gn aid of which the
Hearst -Higsen combination is in the
field) give pledges, if given power at
gro suffrage or to cut off proportionate-
| ly the representation of the Southern
States in Congress and electoral Col
lege. But for the solid delegation in
Congress from the South, reinforced by
faithful Democrats from the North and
| West, the hateful Force bill, which put
shalls and Supervisors, would still be
in operation; and but few weeks ago
the Republican majority in the House
of Representative voted unanimously
to restore that hateful measure to the
| Statute books. To the reduction of the
Southern voice in the National coun-
ellis, as an alternative to equality of
political privileges to the negro, Mr..
Taft gives his cordial sympathy and
endorsement" and, if he disapproved
| the remaining provision of the Crum
packer amendment, he has been stu
diously careful not to say so.
And this is the settled program of
that Republican party with which, ad
dressing Southern audience, Mr..
Higsen said, "He had no quarrel" OF
course not But have the Democrats
of Virginia and Georgia no quarrel with
the party which brought them into
political subjection to their former
slaves in the past and which threatens
now to restore that condition or ex-
clude the South from an equal voice in
the general government? Mr.. Higsen
said nothing about this subject in his
Norfolk speech; neither did Mr. Graves
touch upon it in Richmond. Why
not? Because they shave no quarrel
with the Republican party" but are en-
listed to reinforce Taft by drawing off
recruits from the Democrats.
Mr.. Taft is pledged to insist on the
wholesale reinfranchisement of the
Southern negro, or that refused, to
emasculation of the South's vote in
Congress. The New York World de-
clares that "The South is living in
FOOLS paradise if it does not realize that
| this is no campaign profession but
real issue" Yet the World is not en-
amored of Mr.. Bryan. Where is the
sagacity of the South, where it's jeal-
ousy of right, that it does not rise as
one man to resent the insult and repel
the menaced peril?
The Southern man who votes for
Taft will be holding out his hands for
political manacles and will be stopping
to kiss the hand that is raised to smite
his race and his section. The South
ern man who votes for Higsen and
Graves will to that extent weaken the
only force in the field which can rescue
the political virtue of the South from
debauchment and its political heritage
from despoilment. On this supreme
question the Hearst prepagandists are
dumb as oysters, for, if they discussed
it, they might injure the party "with
which they have no quarrel" The one
mission of the Independence League is
to create diversion in favor Taft.
An Estimate.