Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1909-06-15

/ Hy Dear Governor: AS you very well
know, we have never met. You do not
/ Snow me, socially, nor l you. You are
under no private obligations to me, nor
am 1 to you, but you are now about
ending a term as the governor Of the
state in which 1 was born and in whose
| service 1 have spent over 80 years, and
as a Georgian. 1 have a right to express
/ in this public way my sense of obligation
] to you, her retiring chief magistrate. As
| you know, humble as have been my SER
vices to my state, they have been public.
AS a preacher, a teacher and a soldier,
wounded in her cause, sing as one devo-
! ted many years to the study OF her his
tory, and to rescuing much from oblivion
| by my pen, feel that am not presuming
when / speak in this public way of my
| lofty admiration for your work as gov
ernor. l do this publicly, because 1t is a
public concern, and not mere matter
| between friend and friend.
! It is but due to you to say that in no
way have you disappointed those who by
such an unprecedented vote placed you in
the governors seat. You have done q
work for Georgia for which she can new
er repay you, and the benefit of which
will be realized more and more as the
years go by.
without referring to your careful over
sight of her temporal matters you will
| allow me to speak as Christian minister
of what you have done for her higher
| interests. No one who knows the mon
| etary sacrifice which a lawyer with your
practice made in giving so much service
| to the public, could accuse you of any
sordid desire in accepting the position you
| have held. You went into office with
clan hands. standing against corporate
wealth and not with it. and you go out
of it not the richer man because of your
| work.
| AS an illustration of public life of the
| olden time you are eminent. Georgia has
never had up to this time a governor who
has been more unassailable here. In the
| selection of your appointees, In the con-
duct of the finances no man has ever had
| the temerity to even intimate a charge
against you.
| In those great moral reforms which
have marked your administration you
have done the state a service by your
/ approval, and by your active efforts to
promote them, for which future gener-
atoms will be grateful. But for your
subordinating your own private views
to the views of the majority of your
people, you might have blocked again
the earnest efforts of the anti-saloon
men to break up this shameful and
horrible traffic Your own judgment
was against the effort to make this
] prohibition state wide by statute. You
might have prevented it by a veto, but
you yielded your convictions to the
| wish es Of your people. For this you
incurred the bitterest hate of a pow
erfuI party, and their determination to
visit upon you the severest penalty in
their power. This you knew was COM
II ing, and this we knew did come; but
II that law is repealed and the cursed
saloon is in full blast again in Georgia
1t will not be the fault of Georgia's
governor, nor, 1 may say, of the 100000
of the best people of the state who
stood at his back.
The repeal Of the law allowing the
leasing Of convicts as we all know was
Intensely fought by those who fought
you. 1t has been said it was a stand
ing shame that brought the flush Of