The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1908-07-31
\ GREAT PUBLIC UTTERANcE

In accepting the nomination for
governor of Georgia by the white dem
ocratic vote as expressed in the pr1-
mary election, Hon. Jos. N. Brown,
among other things, uses the follow
ing language:
Scarcely one year ago our state
stood on the pinnacle Of unparalleled
prosperity. Capital was receiving its
greatest dividends. labor It's highest
wages, and the products Of the farm,
quarry and mine averaging prices top
ped with gain.
Yet, even at that period a cloud
was gathering upon the SKY of Gao--
gia's peace. And quickly following G
change Of administration the storm
burst came.
1t is not needful that We reciJe the
details. The fact stands that the
sawmill shut down. the factory cur
tailed its output the jobbing house
withdrew its statesmen, the farmer
found the price OF his products re-
duced, the developer refra-ned from
building the trolley line or the rail
road. the labOring man ere many
weeks was out of a job.
What was the cause of this paraly-
sis Of business? Agitation. Agitation
which denounced the corporation
but ignored the fact that the cOrpOr-
alton was but the union of individual
citizens. This agitation seemed to
take no account of the fact that the
interest of capital and labor are in
separately interviewer, that the blue
thread of the one cannot be with
drawn from the cloth without hope
lessly weakening the texture of the
red thread of the other.
The really pathetic feature of the
catastrophe lay in the fact that while
the blow was blindly aimed at the
dome Of corporation it struck in the
cottages Of the minority stockholders
and employees of the corporation;
while it was intended to lessen the
profits of one species OF corporations
it crippled the stockholders and eth
er seriously reduced or swept away
the wages Of the employees Of all cor
poratiOns and curtailed the comforts
of life in every household in the state.
do not charge that this result was
the design of the agitatOrs Yet, the
ignorance Of those who assume ID be
teachers can work as disastrous
wreck as can the hand of intelligent
enmity. l do not say that the panic
was the sole work Of the administra-
ton in Georgia: but as well might We
deny that the Missouri river is a ma
terial part o. the lower Mississippi
as 10 deny that the threats and the
attempted legislation in Georgia to
place a tax Of one per cent. upon the
gross incomes of the owners of all
corporations. regardless OF whether
there was any net income. eleven
months ago. drove capital out OF our
state or into the safety deposit vaults,
caused the enormous shrinkage in
values, lessened the volume of bust
ness. handicapped the farmers and
threw thousands of men out of en-
ployment
Herein then lay the cause which
impressed upon capital and
labor the fact that each, properly
restrained and properly protected,
was absolutely indispensable to the
other, and which forced them to unite
in the judgment that the official poll
cy the state had recently adopted
must be reversed, that prosperity of
all kinds must have equal rights, that
and cooperation must
take the place Of mistrust and denun-
citation, that the hand-clasp must be
offered instead of the big stick.
In this spirit we have now met, re-
peating those words from our states
constitution which but a few days
ago were so impressively spoken by
one of Georgia's most gifted orators,
viz: Protection of person and prop
erty is the paramount duty Of gov
eminent, and shall be impartial and
complete"
That protection Georgia guarantees
to her own citizens and to the
citizens of other states and other gov
ernments who locate their invest
ments within her borders. She guar
antees it equally to owners of farms,
factories, quarries, mines, banks, rail
roads. and all other legitimate invest
mentS.