The Birmingham age-herald., 1910-11-25
ATLANTA AND MACON
 IN SHARP CONTEST Georgia Capital Wants Mercer University to Move PREACHERS TAKE HAND Fight for Removal of Educational In- stitution Has Become Warm and
 Hzsiness Men Are Much
 E1serested
PREACHERS TAKE HAND


 proposal to remove Mercer university from Macon to Atlanta, if persisted in as it appears now it will be- is going to bring on one Of the hardest fights ever witnessed between two Georgia cities.
 There is no special love lost between them as cities now, and this contest will only make things worse.
 The fact that it is a fight in which the Bap1st preachers of each city are align ed against each other is not In any wise calculated to soften it's bitterness. The Atlanta preachers have gone out after Mercer with the vim and enthusi- asm of a chamber of commerce tacklng boom proposition. They didn't just ap- point a committee, but they are going in body before the special committee ap- pointed by the Baptist convention at . Elberton,s to present reasons and argu- ments for the removal here of the insti- tution.
 Undoubtedly. Macon's Baptist ministers will do the same thing.
 The chief arguments for removal ap- pear to be that the institution is cramp- ed in Macon and that there Is no room for 1t to spread: that there is plenty of room in Atlanta and that this city would prove better vantage point con- ducing to larger attendance and greater growth.
 Macon disputes all these points and shows where Mercer will have to re- linquish property worth $250,0O0, if 1t Is taken away from the Central City.
 The ministers know all that and have already informed Atlanta, in a general way. that this city will have to furnish a spacious site and $250.00O in cash if the institution is to come here.
 But if the Atlanta Chamber of Com merce should decide that the game was worth s250,ooo 1t would go into the fight and get the cash all right.
 It Is not often that two sister cities engage in a fight of this kind. It not infrequently happens that two or more of them will go out after some new in- stitution that Is proposed, but 1t seldom happens that one of them tries to take away a. thing that another has already
 When that sort of an effort is made there is sure to be a howl. Of course Atlanta will put it off on the minis ters; they are doing it. But that the city will lend strenuous helping hand there is no question.
 Speaking of contests among cities, some years ago Savannah almost had a United States sub treasury within her grasp. She was just ready to reach out and lay hold upin 1t when Atlanta, like big brother came up and tried to swipe the candy. Then other southern cities got into the scrap with the result that the southeast is still without a sub-treasury, which this section might have had if 1t had just left Savannah alone to eat the pie uubicl, if had already cooked
 Will. People See salomes
 Has the south reached the point where it would offer no objection to the presentation here, of Strauss Sa : lome?
 That question seems to have come up in Atlanta in connection with the movement to bring the Chicago Grand Opera company here next spring.
 salome. 1t seems, is one of the lead ing roles of Mary Garden, the high priced as we'll as high-voiced so- prano.
 In discussing the question as to what grand operas should be presented here some of the directors of the Atlanta Music Festival association were anx- ious to have Salome Others thought that some objection might be raised to il in certain quarters.
 It Is still up in the air, therefore, as to whether Salome will be on the programme. If not the opera chosen 10 be presented in the place of it will be Massenet's "Thais," in which, next to "Saleme," Miss Garden is also famous.
 "Salome" had a struggle before it finally got it's sea legs in New York and Chicago: then it achieved popu- Iarity largely on account of Mary Gar den.
 The association with only two days work has practically completed the raising of the s4O,00O guarantee fund to bring the grand opera company to Atlanta. Of course this means that the subscribers simply guarantee the as- sociation against any loss on the ven- ture. It Is proposed to have the com pany here April and 8, 1911.