The times and democrat. [volume] (Orangeburg, S.C.) 1881-current, 1909-11-25
A BASE LIE
Told on Confederate Leaders by !he Ns-
chant Marine League
BY WATSON


! The League in It's Efforts TO Looe
;, the Public Treasury for the nene-
fit of the Shipping Trust slandeFs
Jefferson Davis. Robert Tombs anss
! Other Leaders.
In his Weekly Jefiersonian MIR.
Thomas E. Watson vigorously re-
flutes foul falsehood that is being
circulated by he Merchant Marine
League, in its effort to loot the ma
tional treasury for the benefit Of the
shipping trust. To cover the truth,
that the high protection tariff caused
the decline of our merchant marine,
a monstrously false charge Is made
against Jeff Davis, Toombs and other
leaders. The Jefersonian says:
On page 10 of the American Flag
for September, 1909, we find the
headline:
destruction Of Marine Plonned."
Then the League historian" pro-
ceeds to relate how Jefferson Davis
and other Southern hadsrs, antici-
pating secession and war, conspired
!, with British agents to destroy the
! American Marine J.!
frontery to charge this treason On
Jefferson Davis, when he was a MEM
ber OF the Cabinet of President
II Pierce. The League declares that
this plot" of the Southern leaders
was not perfected in 1885," but
that these loDg-headed, evil minded
southerners kept on scheming and
conspiring against the merchant ma
rine-having in view, always, seces-
sion and civil war. The League, OF
;: course, mentions Robert Toombs az
!, one Of the arch-eonspirators.
| The name of Davis and Toombe
!, are used for sinister purpose. Those
names are as unpopular In the East,
North and West as the names OF
Stanton and Sherman are at the
South.
u 1t is almost impossible to deaa
patiently with lies of the sort one
finds the Hanna-c -cannon-Aldrich Lea
que is circulating.
II Robert j. Lowery, of Atlanta
and D. a. Eomkins, Of Charlotte, n
c., and Geo. W. Brunson, iJr., OF
Greenville, S. c., have the true
: Southern blood in their veins, they
will denounce the outrageous slander
of the League. 1t is the lowest,
meanest. vilest attempt to bolster
up a bad measure with sectional pref
; udice.
The League virtually says to the
North, Robbers and traitors of the
South formed plot with British
agents to destroy the merchant ma
rine in order that secession mighs
succeed. Protective tariffs did not
drive the American flag from the
seas Southern rebels like Jefferson
Davis, Reuben Davis and Robert
Toombs did il. Now in the name
of pure patriotism, reinstate the mef-
GIANT marine with bounties from the
common treasury"
How amazing that this vicious ana
foul slander should have provoked
no resentment in the South.
The League accuses Jefferson Da-
Wis of starting the plot at the time
3 when secession was not even in the
air. The South and the Democratic
party were in the saddle, and fully
expected to remain there. Mr.. Da-
Wis opposed secession down to the
very last. At the time he was IN
Pierce's Cabinet there wasn't
stronger Union man in America. He
was planning and mapping out routes
for the transcontinental railwaya.
He was actually making the surveys
for the great trunk lines which vera
to fasten the Union together moro
securely.
AS to Robert Toombs, he and Mr.
Stephens had just made one OF the
erandest of fights in Georgia against
the dlsunionists, and they had won .
decisive victory!
Talk about Toombs and DAVIS
planning the war during the admin
istration OF Pierce and Buchanans
Why, these Southern leaders, I'D
1855, no more dreamed OF the SUD"
den disruption Of their great party
at the Charleston convention OF 1861
] than they suspected that JenersoN
E Davis would one day be prisoner ia
: irons at Fortress Monroe.
j AS to bng-headcd preparations tof
, civil war, ] thought that every we'll
' Informed child knew that the seced-
! ing States made no preparations
r whatever. Why? Because it was
no, believed that the North would
! attack the South; and the South had
: no thought OF attacking the North
Toombs was quite sincere when
he declared that he would drink ala
, The blood that would be Shed. THAT
was his vivid way of expressing his
belief that the North would not in
undo tho South