Oxford eagle. (Oxford, Lafayette Co., Miss.) 1876-current, 1922-10-05
TOM WATSON DEAD;
ASTHMA THE CAUSE
Georgia's Political Firebrand' Senator
One of Most Brilliant Men i'm Sen
ate-His Successor in Doubt.

Washington, Sept. 26.-The death
here today of Senator Thomas E.
Watson, the "firebrand of the Sen
ate," and political dictator of Georgia,
promises revolution in politics in
the state, as viewed by Georgians at
the capitol.
Senator Watson died at his subur-
ban home, Chevy Chase. Md, at 3
o'clock this morning, following an in
ternittent illness from astha that had
kept him at home the greater part of
the last three weeks and from which
he had suffered for Is wears. His
death, however came unexpectedly.
Senator Watson's body will be taken
to his home at Thomson. Ga, for
funeral and interment, leaving Wash
ington at 3:15 o'clock tomorrow after
noon.
An Unusual Career.
The death of Senator Watson marks
the passing of a brilliant pamphleteer,
historian of merit, an orator pos
sessing the ability to larrup po-
litical devil around the stump in the
shake of a cats tail-and an erratic
genius who permitted prejudice to
blind reason and passion to distort
truth.
Watson was born in the old south,
lived in the new south, but was not
necessarily representative of either.
He took to his heart the prejudices
of the Georgia Cracker" and adorned
them with his intellect. ad he lived
in the east, or norh, or west, the stars
would have still been wrong in their
courses when viewed through his
spectacles.
Born in Columbus County, Ga, he
was admitted to the bar in 1876. When
the wave on populism swept America
the imam in the hills"-the small land
owner and the day laborer-thronged
the ranks of the party that promised
heaven on earth. Watson deserted the
aristocratic traditions and threw
himself into the folds of the populist
flag. His reward was a seat in the
Fifty second Congress. While there
he secured the first appropriation for
free delivery of rural mails that Con-
gress ever passed.
He was nominated for vice presi-
dent at the st. Louis Populist con-
vention in 1896 which indorsed Bryan
for president. In 1904 he was NOM
mated for president by the Peoples
party. He made an extensive tour of
the south at that time, but was more
ridiculed than admired. One night in
Nashville, after negro fife and drum
corps had paraded the streets all day
advertising his meeting, Watson spoke
to less than corporaPs guard in Ry-
man Auditorium THAT house $500 per-
sons.
From 1900 to 1909 he was busy at
Thompson writing history, essays and
fiction. His "Story of France" was
as brilliant as a diamond with a cash
across it's face. 1t was written in
poetical prose, but prejudice against
Catholicism robbed it of truth. 1t was
used in the French schools after the
separation of church and state.
Between times he edited Tom Wat
sons Magazine, first published in New
York, and he effersonian Magazine.
His publications were barred from
the mails on the charge of obsenity
and he was prosecuted in the United
States court. Watson was his own
lawyer. After several trials he was
acquitted.
Watson then established the Co
lumbia Sentinel, more pamphlet than
journal, which was mainly devoted to
the expression fhis views against
many accepted institutions, no the least
being the Catholic hieracy.
Defeated H0ke Smith.
In 1920 he received the Democratic
nomination over Senator Hoke Smith