The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 18??-1935, 1908-02-14
GREAT OVATION
To SEGY TAFT
MEMORABLE BANQUET GIVEN At
KANSAS CITY IN HIS
HONOR.
TALKS ON FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT
Declares That southerners Have
- Been The Best Friends
Of Negro.

KANSAS CITY. Mo-. Feb. 10.-Wil
liam H Taft, Secretary of War, wal
given a memorable ovation by large
throng in Convention Hall tonight
when he was the guest of honor and
principal speaker at the most elab
crate banquet ever attended in this
city. given by the Association OF
Young Republicans of Missouri. and
attended by 1900 persons, many OF
whom came from Nebraska, Kansas
Oklahoma and distant Missouri cities
Then demonstration when Secretary
Taft entered the banquet hall and
again when he rose to speak has never
been surpassed by a welcome given
any public man in the history of this
city.
Each of the 1000 banqueters paid
$3.50 for the privilege Of attending,
but the balconies of the hall were free
to the public, and long before the
speaking began standing room was at
a premium.
Secretary Taft's speech was a gen.
eral defense Of the Republican party,
and especially of the policies brought
to the fore by the administration Of
Theodore Roosevelt. In eulogizing
Lincoln the speaker said Lincoln was
party man, as all men must be
who expect to leave their individual
impression upon the political charac-
ter of the Nation"
Secretary Taft spoke of the three
war amendments of the Constitution,
the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fiji
teenth. The operation Of the Fiji
teenth amendment, that which forbade
any State to deprive the negro Of his
vote on account of his color or
previous kind of servitude, had not,
he said, been as successful as that of
the Thirteenth and Fourteenth. The
leaders Of the South had in many
States, however, cast about to make
the law square with the existing con-
dition by property and educational
qualification which would exclude
most of the negro vote.
This very DESIRE" said the speak
or, ito avoid the violent methods
which were wont to overcome the col
ored vote in the South itself indicates
a turn for the better. It is said. how
ever, and with truth, that these cleo
ton laws are intended to be enforced
by means of the discretion vested in
election officers, SO as to exclude the
Ineligible colored men with rigor and
% allow the ineligible whites who
ought also be excluded, to the injury
,r the franchise. Deplorable as this
s, still the situation is by no means a
lopeless one, for the Southern negro
nd the party he may in the future
xercise. 6
1.-THE greatest friend the Southern =
egro is likely to have is the broad
linded Southern white man who sym.
athizes with the co1ored man and
nows his value to the South. Nor
it unreasonable to hope that men y
no have already sought to come
thin the law and avoid violence will
timately see the wisdom and right
BUSINESS of the equal enforcement of
e law of eligibility against white te
ID black" w
Secretary Taft said that he was con. -
lent that in the end the fifteenth III
nendment will prove to be a bull aS
ark equally beneficial with that of 90
Q thirteenth and fourteenth amend y
ents to an unfortunate, down-trod. sa
n, struggling race. No
The time has come, in my judg- NJ
mt, when 1t is the duty Of our party ~
make an earnest effort to win to y n Is
support the many southerners 'n'
10 think with us on every living v"
tional issue and have only been ga
pit from our ranks by the ghost OF POI
past" "a rou
Ioe