The Montgomery advertiser., 1909-07-06
rs HE cxAR or ALAaAMAf

Another autocrat has arisen In Ala
bama. Governor Conner having failed
to NIL the position adequately. Rev.
Mr.. Brooks Lawrence Is trying to
edge the Governor aside and to out
herod Herod.
| The Rev. Mr.. Lawrence 10 exceed
| ingly stirred up by some of the Su-
preme Courts recent decisions, and he
is breathing threatenings and siaush-
ter against that body. He assumeg
that he is a better lawyer than the
majority of the court, and he has been
lecturing them for invading "the realm
Of legislation" But he does not stop
there: he proposes to make the court
over. Listen at him:
Is aroused and has been wedding out
| from public Office the men who favor
the liquor traffic, and they will con-
tinue to do this until every liquor
| Judge, solicitor, sheriff and police on
Ger In our State has been laid out un-
| der a beautiful political tombstone Of
ballots. I know whereof ] speak. for
the sentiment Of Alabama is stronger
today against the liquor trafic than
We have only begun our fight and
| we will keep 1t UP until we have JUS
| tice. II we cannot get 1t In the courts.
constituted of men who will not work
overtime in their efforts to protect
the liquor outlaws Of Alabama. The
people of this State propose to have
this law fully tested by its friends
failure at the hands of its enemies.
The big I" is very prominent In
| that declaration. He Is the autocrat
| the Gear, and "r' (the superintendent
of the Anti-Saloon League), intend to
reconstitute the court. He implies
that his league is stronger than ever,
| and that with that machine he can
accomplish his purpose.
But In his bold assumption Of au-
tocracy Gear Lawrence does not stop
with the county officers and the Su-
preme Court Hear him further:
II court decisions against US are
ever well founded on constitutional
inhibitions. then the people Of Ala
bama will change the Constitution Of
the State to meet the situation. The
day of saloon keeper, gambler. harlot
and pimp domination in government
is drawing to a close in Alabama.
He is going to rewrite the Consti-
tuition. He il going to change the
laws of property. He would make
liquor absolutely contraband and Its
ownership an evidence of criminal in
tent.
1t is very clear that Mr.. Lawrence
is very mad, and many of his friends
even will readily admit that he Is
talking foolishly. There is no sort
Of decency in his arraigning the Su-
preme Court as part and parcel Of
an alleged pimp domination in this
State. Nor is there any consistency
in his criticising the Supreme Court
for protecting the liquor anarchist,
when he himself Is arraigning our
highest judicial body in terms no less
disrespectful than the Chicago anarch-
lists did the Illinois State and Fed
eral courts some years ago. Mr..
Lawrence cannot be condemned too
| severely for his ignorant, unjust and
Incorporate attack on the Supreme
Court.
But there is something more i'm
portant In his utterance than its van
ity, its intemperance and Its injustice.
Those features concern him alone as
an individual, The, serious thing, is
his Implied boast that he has a ma.
chine in his control that can change
courts and constitutions, that it is
stronger than ever before. Has his
Anti-Saloon League swallowed the
| Democratic Party in Alabama? Has
he built up an organization through
out the State to which Democrats are
consciously or unconsciously rendering
first obedience? These questions are
vital and fundamental.
| For our part, we don't credit his
boast. We don't beneve that the
majority of Alabama Democrats have
turned over their intelligences and
condolences into his keeping. And II
any large number of them have I'M
consciously done SO, we expect to see
them shake off his domination when
they see to what extremes this new
political boss proposes to go. The
people Of the South in 1851 had the
spirit. of independence sufficiently to
rebel against the abolitionists who
proposed on a moral issue to defy the
courts and laws. and to rewrite the
Constitution. We don't believe that
their children have so changed as
voluntarily and deliberately to permit
any self-constituted political leader.
on another moral issue. to lord 1t over
them.
Plainly the question before the peo-
pie Of Alabama Is not so much liquor
and its great evils, or prohibition
laws; the real question is whether Mr..
Brooks Lawrence is the political Gar
of the State. with the power to make
and unmake officials, courts and Con-
| situations.
|