The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-09-29

discussion by saying: Let us begin at the beginning" which is most difficult thing to do. and particularly so. when dealing with Liberty and Ticks.
 Liberty, to the average American means license and license equals doing as you please. In the broadest sense there is an American ideal toward which in- dividual and national development pitches and no one can be free until he Is ao- solutely at one with this ideal. The ideal never gives an inch but the individual is bent and twisted until the ideal and the man move the one with the other without friction, until there is such rhythm in the movement that 1t may be said the citizen Is at liberty to move when and where he pleases, but he never chooses to move otherwise than within the limits and the meaning of the ideal Growing life may demand slight changes in the ideal, and when it does, there is aIwsys the task of subduing the individ- ual to the new dimensions.
 This is the school in which liberty builds her citadel in human understandings Otherwise the living spirit must succumh 10 the rigid letter of government. And so it remains a question: whether un- written constitutions, like England's, are not atfer all better than written constl- tutions. like Americas.
 In descending to those trivial dispute tions common to all communities of good folk, the difficulty in defining lines for the control of human conduct is that We do not, like the F'renchman, begin at gta En tu n !, recognizing that we are dealing with the same principle in the handling of the af- fairs of single county or beat. when liberty is involved. as when we are deal ing with the greater affairs of our great CT government, and that the varied and 1complex interests of all are involved in what, at first glance, seems to belong a lingle man or a single plantation. NO sooner does one clearly convince nimseif that certain line of conduct Is perfect- 1y within his rights. looked at one way, ahan he comes against higher rule, which makes the paradox, that no man has, nor can have, right to all his <i.sssts looked at another way. Mutual ! sspendences make 1t impossible The l swinging of a man roughly up against s-e demands of high principles arouses
 n.ciousness-known to metaphyslclans -. ssbconsciousness--and he awakes to the srue meaning of liberty, understanding that it is anything else than doing as one ipieas~s except where will and liberty are }one The vexing problems of the indi- vidual thus turn out to be his tutor 10 ] fetch him to his school mistress, liberty. who in turn teaches him that she cannot he had except in marriage when the ) twain become one. The individual, by this | process, is free to act out his disposi- lton, without restraint, in every direction, which is liberty in its essence. In the meanwhile. however, the inner man has 3been buIded into such oneness with lib- erty that the outer man cannot. nor does he desire to go contrary to her bidding, be that bidding limited to Sumter coun- ty, Alabama, or to the United States of America.
 Nineteenth Century
 Before Victor Hugo died he succeeded in impressing upon the mind of man that the nineteenth was the greatest century for achievement in the history of the race. The impressiveness was duo 10 a larger understanding of the larger
 man and his larger needs. Since the days that Moses had flung a handful of dust into the air and 1t turned to lice and put the Egyptians out of business, man has known that his most dangerous tor mentors are those that live in little bodies, but he has been mighty slow in grasping the fact that these pestiferous little beings could be conquered. The nineteenth century witnessed the crea- ton anew of biology and since then man has devoted moro energy to germs and their destruction than to war. A new and poblsr fieid of conquest opened to him and he put his hand to the job. No single man, nor combination of men, can stay that hand. In conquering the insect it is but natural to expect that tho fool killer is going to have his hands full too. Individuals have failci. and will for a long time yet fail. to see why the government should undertake to compel one to kill lice, when they are his lice. or to kill ticks. when they are his ticks. Nevertheless, the government says to the individual, You must Kill your lice. and you must kill your ticks. and good citizenship is shown as clearly in obeying this mandate as it would be in shouldering a musket and marching to the front when the country calls to arms.
 Now I propose to come from these pre- ambulations to the Frenchman's idea or beginning at the beginning" and dis cuss Liberty and Ticks in Sumter county.
 I have made 1t rule never to take liberties with persons, in my writing, i whose integrity I do not have un- bounded confidence and for whom I do not entertain the highest personal re- gard. Those to whom I shall refer, In this article. are my warm personal friends. I have often had my feet un- der the mahogany of most of them I have been the preceptor of the sons of others in college and I have been asso- cIated with all in such ways that they will understand, thoroughly, that nm not doing by them other than anyone. or all of them, may be at liberty to do by me.
 HObsOn and Ticks
 Tick eradication was developing in the brain of a certain brilliant .soung Alabamian long before he entered the field of politics and quite while be- fore it became warm number In Sum- ter county. When the Hon. Richmond .. Hobson defeated the Hon. J. H.