Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1912-09-02
COURT TO HEAR BITTER
BLUE RIDGE JUDGESHlP
CON TEST WEDNESDAY

Now that Chairman. William j. Harris,
of the state Democratic executive COM
mittee, has completed the committee by
naming the fifteen members for the state
at large, and has called the entire COM
mittee to meet in Atlanta on Wednesday
for the purpose of considering the con-
tested judgeship nomination in the Blue
Ridge circuit, that interesting and sensa-
tional fight is of immediate concern.
The situation in the Blue Ridge circuit
is no new story. For years elections in
that vicinity have reeked with scandal.
Nowhere else in Georgia is factionalsm
so rampant or feeling so bitter
1t was that way when George r. Gober
was judge. The strenuousness and the
uncompromising meanness-no other word
seems to fit SO eXactly-of politics in the
Blue Ridge were the things that finally
drove Gober from the bench and to a
residence in another part of the state.
And not that Gober nor yet mis- faction
ever were thought to be sprouting an
gelic wings, either
The lineup in the Blue Ridge-in dear
old Gilmer and Fannin and Pickens." par
ucularly-ts most peculiar. There Repub-
licans and Democrats are about evenly
divided Party lines are tightly drawn,
party principles are doggedly adhered to,
even if heartily misunderstood and mis-
interpreted in hundreds of instances
Divided by the War.
The people in Gilmer and Fannin and
Pickens are pure Anglo-Sa Saxon They
have been right there for more than a
hundred years-they and their fathers,
and their grandfathers and their great
grandfathers before them.
They divided into two camps when the
Civil war came along-many of them
going into the Union army, and as many
more into the Confederate.
In many sections of Massachusetts,
Union sentiment was not nearly so ram
pant in the COS as it was in Gilmer and
Fannin and Pickens, and in many sections
of Virginia Confederate sentiment was
less aggressive than it was in these three
mountainous counties of northeast Geor-
gia.
If there is truly section Of the country
where they do not know the war is
over" it is in Gilmer and Fannin and
Picllens counties Georgia
In these sections, every mans political
pedigree is known. The people have mar
ried and intermarried, and often the bit
terest of political enemies up there will be
found to be closely connected by family
ties.
Democratic men have welded Republi-
can women, and Republican men have
married Democratic women.
The miX-up would seem to have been
so thorough and complete that factionaI
lines might have been expected to dis
appear But not sO-apparentIy they be
come more and more definite as time goes
along.
Few Fair Elections There.
1t IS doubtful whether perfectly fair
election has been held in Gilmer in TWEEN
ty years. If Democrats rule the ma
chinery. Republicans are ruthlessly ruled
off the registration lists and kept out of
the ballot boxes. And it is exactly and
precisely the other way around.
The adherents of Judge Patterson. a
party to the immediate fight on Morris
claim that Gilmer county was stolen for
Judge Norris. 1t may have been Pat
terson produces much evidence to uphold
his case.
Taking the Patterson petition in hand
and going through it as the counts are
arranged, it sets up these alleged facts:
That Patterson, outside of Gilmer county,
received a majority over Morris of 522
votes; that Judge Morris knew this be-
fore the Gilmer county returns were COM
piled and announced; that he called up