Tazewell Republican. [volume] (Tazewell, Va.) 1892-1919, 1912-02-08
"CONTIGUOUS AND COMPACT"

sohADle GENIAL OF the absolute verify of
our Interpretation Of Section 55 of the
State Constitution, which provides for
the apportionment of congress districts,
the Roanoke Times has adopted its uni
form tactics, when cornered and con-
fused, of trying to escape from one
msnifestly false position by rushing to
one more intensely false.
1t will be remembered by our readers
that in our issue of the LIST instant we
discussed at some length said section of
the constitution of Virginia, and pub
hshed in the same issue an editorial
from the Roanoke Times, headed RE
districting.''
In its issue of the 3rd instant the
Times published another editorial, Con
tiguous and Compact, and acknowl-
edges that its statement of the law for
redistrictiDg, made in its editorial RE
districting," was untrue. We publish
In another column the Contiguous and
Compact" editorial of the Times and
ask that it be carefully considered by
our readers, that they may determine
what confidence should be placed in the
intelligence or sincerity of the Times.
when it writes about a matter of such
grave Importance as this one of redis-
tricting the State. The recklessly jocu-
lar and frivolous vein in which the
Times treats this serious question.
shows that it believes that 1.-THE white
people and the Democrats of Virginia
have arrived at the state of machine
politics and policies at which virtue,
honesty and patriotism are to be re-
garded as mere names and hypocritical
pretenses with which to deceive fools
and suckers and the mass of the peo-
pie"
Surely the Times must think its honest
readers are fools and suckers" or it
would not give to the public such silly
Interpretation of the contiguous and
compact" requirements of Section 55
of the Constitution.
The Times in its editorial. "Redis-
tricting," made this positively false
declaration:
The law requires that the terri
tory constituting a congress district
shall adjoin. That is all it does re-
quire."
When we exposed the falsity of this
assertion the Times had to acknowledge
that the law required that the territory
from which congress district is form
ed shall be contiguous and compact. "
Our contemporary then asserts that the
shoestring district which it wishes
formed, reaching from the east line of
Russell county to the west line of Luz
nenburg county, will be contiguous and
compact in every sense of the word, be-
cause it will be an unhroken line. The
absurdity and falsity of this very fool
Ish proposition is demonstrated by an
other that is positively silly, when the
Times declares:
In these days we measure con-
tiguity and compactness not bv
miles but by time and convenience"
If this be the true measure of 'con-
tiguity and compactness, why admit
that it is ESSENTIAL that the counties con-
shutting congress district shall ad-
join in an unbroken line? And why did
''We'' write into the Constitution the
words contiguous and compact" ex-
cept that 1--WE" desired to ''stand out
before the world as liars and hypo-
crites?" And if the law be as you con-
strue it, why may 1--WE" not carry out
your nefarious purpose by attaching
Tazewel to the Sixth district and let
Bland and Giles remain in the Ninth?
The reasoning of the Times is as shall
low and false as its scheme is wicked
and partisan. We will again reproduce
Section IS of the Constitution, which
the Times has not had the courage to
do along with it's false definition or
analysis of this section The Constitu-
lion says:
"The General Assembly shall by =
law apportion the State into dis :
tricts. corresponding with the num- .
Der Of representatives to which it Il
may be entitled In the House of "