Pocahontas star herald., 1926-08-19
Supports Amendment 13

To the Editor Star Herald
| The Star Herald comes to my home
just as Ii has for years, and in an issue
of the paper a few weeks back, l saw
an article from my good old friend,
Jehu Presley, trying to show the citi-
zens of Randolph county the import
ance Of voting for Amendment No. 10,
which if carried in the state would give
the citizens of the various school dis
tricts of the state a right to vote as
much as Is mills for free school pur-
poses. | said in silent whisper to my
self, "Hurrah for Jehu, and the good
citizens of my native county, old Ran
dolph," and hoped the proposition
would not have much if any opposition.
l see in this mornings Star Herald
where Mr. Whitrock of Hamil comes
out in an article opposing Amendment
13 on the grounds that ii will work a
hardship on the poor people If carried
In the first place If Amendment 13 is
carried ii will not force anything on
anybody, but will remove a basic law
and instead of forcing the people to
stop at ~ mills free school tax with
their vote, as the law now provides, 1t
will give the people who do want a
higher free school tax to vote as high
as IS mills pure and simple for local
purposes. and will place no burdens
on the districts that do not want the
Is mills and vote against it. ] hope
the people of my native county will
give Amendment No. 13 a rOusing ma
jority.
As to 1t working a hardship on the
humble class of folks, that is the ideG'
tical class it will help, and that is the
class that should roll up a large ma
iority for it, The people who have
plenty of money will educate their chill
dren if you had no free school at all,
and never would have. They would
send them away to colleges, and other
schools, and pay for it, but the man
who honestly thinks - or Is mills for
free school purposes is too much to ask
his children would never learn to read
and write if you had no free schools.
y You may say "Well, what of your
business is 1t, you are not citizen of
Randolph county any more" Don't
you believe il. | pay taxes there just
as you do. | own property in POca-
hontas, and have all the time l have
been holding down a job in Alabama,
and / certainly hope Amendment 13
will pass, and my friends in POcahOn-
tas will vote the limit on me in next
school election. l assure you | will
pay Il and smile, for l know II will so
to help educate orphan children just
such as | have been whose parents are
not able to do il themselves. Not only
do own some property in POcah0ntas,
but | am coming back some Of these
days to live on 1t.
The only way in this world my
| friends to elevate your children, and
the citizenship in general is to edu-
cate them, and you cannot educate
them unless you pay for it, and the
only sensible way to pay for it is to
tax all of the people just alike to do
| It. and when you do that the wealth
of the county pays the burden of il,
and not the poor as many think.
had rather turn my children loose
i'm tatters and rags educated. as to
give them millions of dollars and them
unlettered. | know we are enjoying
an age i'm this world when any young
man or lady that is honest, upri sat.
educated. and worker can 90 out
single handed in this busy age, and
find a position on every corner, and
they can climb to the topmost pima
cles Of fame on their own efforts, when
If they have just as much brains, yet,
uneducated, it means life of druid
gerry.
An education is only tool to work
with. and a man or woman out in this
world without it today, is in the same
class as man whose duty il Is to
clear away the forest without an ax,
or any other working tool to cut the
timber with. The work is there, plenty
of it. but he has nothing to work with.
| am absolutely for the best we can
get i'm the free school system, | believe
in free schools. free speech, and free
assemblage, and | am open and above
board opposed to any system of any
law that will limit in any way the ad-
vancement of education.
A. J. Cole.
Rirminnhom Ala