The county record. [volume] (Kingstree, S.C.) 1885-1975, 1913-11-13
TILLMAN SAYS McLAU-
Rim SHOULD MAKE RACE
FOR SENATE TO FIGHT BLEASE-
ISM AS PENANCE FOR PAST
POLITICAL SINS.

JOnn l. McLdurln, dS d peHdnce
due the people of South Carolina,
undertake to destroy Bleaseism, is
suggested by Senator Tillman in a
statement which he has.issued in re-
ply to charges made by Mr. McLaurin
in his recent speech before gather
ing of Blease followers in Columbia.
MIR Tillman says that if McLaurin
will, he can destroy Bleaseism better
than any man in the State, and that
he Senator Tillman) will help him.
Mr. Tillman's statement is as follows:
Tread in the South Carolina papers
John L McLaurin's farewell address,
or statement, withdrawing from the
Governors race and bidding adieu
to politics forever. 1t is a pathetic
utterance-pathetic because it is
the swan song of very brilliant
man. who failed>to be g. very great
man because he lacked the moral
fibre to always be true to himself
and his convictions of right, rather
than allow ambition and selfishness
to warp him. His life, in way, is
sermon, which young men every
where ought to take to heart. Moth
ing in the States history is more
lamentable. If he had only been
true to true Tillmanism, to which
he says he was converted in 1910, he
would be in the United States Sem
ate now and would be an ornament
to it.
McLaurin says: 1t is the irony of
fate that l, who suffered most in
justice from Tillman personally,
should now be the sole defender of
Tillmanism."
There are two things about this
statement upon which l desire to
comment. l never did have any
personal iIl-will towards John L Nc
Laurin and have none now. | de-
nounced him in the Senate because
believed he was a traitor to the
people of the State who had sent
him there. The people were con-
vinced that my charge was true and
have sustained it whenever they had
an opportunity.
When he says he is the sole de-
fender of Tillmanism," he means
among the Bleaseites to whom he
was speaking. He,o of course, knows
there are tens of thousands of Till
NANTES, some of whom voted for
and some against Governor Blease
last year, who have never wavered
in their adherence to Tillmanism as
they understand it, and as he now
understands it.
Mr. Charles Carroll Simms outher-
oded Herod in his Bleaseism, pro-
claiming that it is higher than Till
manism. He illustrates Byron's
couplet:
He stood foe with all the zeal
Which youngand fiery convertsfeel.
He is. no doubt, as sincere in his
Bleaseism now as he was in his Has
kellism in 1890. He never under
stood Tillmanism at all. 1nheriting
grand name he thought he was an
aristocrat and has ended by becom-
ing an anarchist, and wants to run
into the Governors office on dem
agogery. Truly politics does make
strange bedfellows," and if the
Tillmanites who deserted me last
year on account of Blease vote for
Simms for Governor, it will be a re-
markable transformation. 1t will
only show how wild men can become
when their political passions are
aroused, and how little wisdom, or
| reason, governs their actions.
There are some things about Nc
Laurin's statement that are very ad-
mirable, and say now for the first
time since | denounced him on the
floor of the Senate believe he has at
last become a patriot and wants to
do the State all the service he can
during the balance of his life. Of
course, he has played politics so long
and used diplomacy so much that
even now he cannot drop the role all
at once. have felt heretofore that
he was trying to come back" into
politics under the spur of ambition,
and l still believe that was his mo-
tive. l have been hoping that Gov
ernor Blease would endorse him as
successor in the Governors office,
feeling that that would be enough to
damn both of them in the eyes of
the people. But Blease had too
much political sense to make such a
blunder as that, and McLaurin is
wise in withdrawing once for all
into private life.
Tillmanism is charged with being
the father of Bleaseism; Tillman dis